BHARTI AIRTEL LIMITEDINDIA SUSTAINABILITY REPORT 2017

Connecting AndEmpowering Lives With Our Smart Network

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The world is a small place. More so today, than ever before. The miles don’t count, for the other end of the world is always one touch away. That’s the power of communication. We are tied by a thread that has set us free. As a leading telecom company, Airtel is at the heart of the continually evolving communications landscape. We envision a better future and go the extra mile to ensure that we are all connected through an equal thread, and in the process empower the lives of millions.

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Thank you for reading the Fifth Annual Sustainability Report of Bharti Airtel Limited (hereafter referred to as ‘Airtel’). This report, describes our approach towards sustainability and the major actions we took in FY 2016-17 for the advancement of responsible and sustainable practices in our businesses, in relation to our sustainability plan 2020. The scope of this report is our India operations including all businesses under our operational control. The aspect boundaries and content of this report have been referred to reporting principles prescribed in the GRI G4 guidelines.

The report puts forth our attempt to align our business activities and the idea of sustainability, and in doing so, create a positive impact on our stakeholders including customers, suppliers, local communities, investors, employees and government bodies. The very first and crucial step in the process is identifying our most material impacts, and addressing important questions. This report aims at addressing the following questions. What role does

sustainability play in our company’s overall strategic plan?

How do our business activities affect the environment and society?

How can a telecommunications company like Airtel ensure that more and more people get included in the benefits of a sustainable and enriched life?

How do we manage the sustainability and corporate responsibility issues related to some of our key stakeholders including consumers, customers, employees, suppliers, local communities and government?

How to continue leading with constantly increasing resource constraints?

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Under Project Leap, 180000+ new base stations were deployed over last two years.

Over 370 training interventions with over 935000 manhours of training delivered in FY 2016-17.

Benefitted over 3.8 Mn farmers through IFFCO KISAN SANCHAR LIMITED.

Over 198000 children benefitted through Bharti Foundation which is more than a 130% increase from FY 2015-16.

23% reduction in CO2 emissions per square feet in our facility and 9% reduction in CO2 emissions per rackk in data centre operations as compared to FY 2015-16.

Over 71.4 Mn units of renewable power wheeled into our operations

Unveiled India’s first Open Network, setting a new benchmark for transparency in the industry by making the entire network information including coverage, site details and signal strength available to customers.

Recycled over 2400 tonnes of e-waste and refurbished over 500000 DTH units in FY 2016-17.

HIGHLIGHTSfOr fy 2016-17

81% reduction in CO2 emissions per Terabyte (TB) in network infrastructure in the past 5 years and 28.7% reduction as against FY 2015-16.

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Sunil Bharti MittalChairman

Empowering impact of our telecom networks today goes far beyond what the traditional networks were capable of, thanks to the rapidly proliferating applications across sectors – banking, commerce, media, health, education, entertainment. We take pride in the way we help make life better – empower people and spread growth which is inclusive. Sustainability is both intrinsic and complementary to our core business agenda; in fact, it is our way of life. As a responsible corporate, as we focus on creating value for our shareholders and business partners, we endlessly strive to dovetail in the wider welfare goals of the governments in all the 17 countries that we operate in Asia and Africa. Our network expansion in India under ‘Project Leap’ gathered further momentum during this year, under which we added over 66,000 new base stations, making it one of the largest rollouts undertaken anywhere in the world. This underlines our commitment to Government’s Digital India initiative, which aims to make India a vibrant Digital Society. We also unveiled India’s first ‘Open Network’ setting a new benchmark for transparency in the industry by making the entire network information including coverage, site details and signal strength available to our customers. The empowering nature of ‘Open Network’ has already been hailed widely and highlights our commitment to make India self-sufficient and competitive in digital era of the world. Despite being part of a 24x7 energy dependent sector, we are passionate about our efforts to reduce our carbon footprint. Be it our targeted approach to reduce CO2 emission per rack in data centre operations, or motivating more customers to opt for e-bills, or even augmenting generation of renewable energy through green wheeling agreements, we have always been eager to make our operations greener through smart innovations. I have been a propagator of War on Waste (WoW) and our business processes echo readiness for change. Beyond our regular efforts in the course of doing business to contribute to the wider welfare agenda, we also work diligently towards making direct interventions through our philanthropic arm Bharti Foundation. The Foundation is currently reaching out to nearly two lakh rural underprivileged students through its flagship – Satya Bharti School Program and other related initiatives. Its initiatives in the area of rural sanitation – ‘Satya Bharti Abhiyan’, and legal aid for underprivileged undertrials – ‘Nyaya Bharti’, too have gathered momentum during the last few years. Empowerment, inclusion and environment friendly growth constitute the key pillars of our idea of Sustainability. The present report not just details out our sustainability initiatives but also highlights the integrated framework guiding our action on this score. We stay committed to a 360 degree development and I feel proud and grateful to our teams who deliver growth responsibly.

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Telecom services have become a way of life for billions of Indians. Voice and Data Networks form the core backbone of our economy, fueling large enterprise as well as small businesses. Not only do Telecoms contribute to 6.5% of GDP, they also provide around 50000000 jobs directly and indirectly. We have come a long way from having a phone connection as a privilege, to it being a basic necessity of life. We take this responsibility to provide connectivity to our country very seriously. We are committed to serving our customers in a world-class and transparent manner in order to provide the most effective experience over our networks. Telecoms’ potential for being an economic growth engine and a tool for enhancing social equity also requires us to drive our business with greater sustainability and deeper sense of purpose. With that in mind, we have continuously innovated to developed solutions such as m-education, m-health and Payments Bank. In addition, we have worked tirelessly to reduce our carbon footprint throughout our operations. Our sustainable business practices help improve the lives of individuals and families across Airtel, and helps strengthen the connections between our brand and more than 280 million customers we serve every day.

We are committed to providing a world-class experience and with transparency to our customers. Under one such bold initiative - ‘Open Network’ we made our entire network visible to our customers through digital channels such as our website and myAirtel App. Through this, we were able to crowd-source mobile network black-spots from our customers. Based on these feedbacks till date 9,000+ sites have been upgraded and 30,000+ sites optimized. To provide a future ready network we had initiated a network transformation initiative called ‘Project Leap’ in 2016 with an investment of `600000 Mn over 3 years. Under Project Leap we have deployed 180,000+ mobile sites in last 2 years. This is the same as the number of mobile sites deployed in last 20 years, making it one of the largest network roll out globally. Last year Airtel became the first company to formally launch a payments bank in India. This reinforces our commitment to the Government’s vision of financial inclusion and banking services for every citizen. We leveraged our strong distribution backbone to create 280,000 banking points and 1,000+ cashless villages across India. We make great efforts to drive digital literacy in the country. In addition, we have implemented a significant number of initiatives in the fields of disaster relief management, environment protection and other social causes.

Our vision is to reduce our carbon footprint by up to 70 percent in the next 3 years. We will do this by deploying lower power consuming base stations, promoting green sites, driving active site sharing, converting indoor sites to outdoor etc. Overall 50000 sites have been moved from indoor to outdoor, with 15000 in just last one year. Overall 70% of our installed network base has no air conditioning, which reduces our dependency on diesel fuel. Airtel maintains strict adherence to Indian Emission Norms along with its own safeguards to ensure emissions from its network sites are safe.

“Win with People” is one of the key business pillar for us. This strategy focuses at deeply embedding a high performance culture, building capabilities and developing cross functional expertise while promoting inclusivity and diversity. The aim is to grow talent through strong learning, mentoring and succession planning. To imbibe this culture in the organization we have started conducting Career Fairs on ‘Own Your Development’ theme. At Airtel, we are strongly committed to conduct our business with a deeper sense of purpose and responsibility. Through our fifth sustainability report, I bring forward the initiatives that firmly put sustainability at the core of our heart and made our corporate citizenship more meaningful.

Gopal VittalManaging Director & CEO (India & South Asia)

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• verview

• mbedding ustainability

• ustainable ommunity evelopment

• nhancing ustomer xperience

• rotecting ur lanet

• in ith eople

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Bharti Airtel Limited is a leading global telecommunications company with operations in 17 countries across Asia and Africa. Headquartered in New Delhi, India, the company ranks amongst the top 3 mobile service providers globally in terms of subscribers.

In India, we offer a portfolio of services including voice and data solutions over fixed, wireless and internet platform, DTH, and enterprise services, including national & international long distance services to carriers.

OUr BUSINESS

Bharti Airtel fy 2016-17*

Turnover (Mn)

Capital Investment (Mn)

`198,745

Customer Market Share India

23.39%

Population Covered (Bn)

1.87

`954,683

*Globally

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MOBIlE SErvIcES

Cellular mobile services across 17 countries355 Mn wireless subscribers globally

Around 5% of global population connected through Airtel’s network

47.3% increase in data usage in FY 16-17 as against FY 15-16

HOMES SErvIcES (fIxEd lINE ANd BrOAdBANd)

2.1 Mn broadband and internet customers

793387 towns and villages have been connected through high speed mobile broadband

dIgItAl tv

12.81 Mn subscribers

Coverage across 639 districts

AIrtEl PAyMENtS BANk

India’s first payment bank

Active services in all 29 states of India with over 250000 banking points

OUr SErvIcES

Airtel has two distinct Customer Business Units i.e. B2C (Business to Customer) and B2B (Business to Business). The B2C business unit services retail consumers, homes and small offices. The B2B business unit services large corporates and telecom carriers.

AIrtEl BUSINESS

Airtel business provides a broad portfolio of services to large enterprises, the Government, small & medium businesses and carrier customers in 50 countries.

It is India’s leading and most trusted provider of communication and Ict services, offering services that include voice, data, network integration, data center & managed services, enterprise mobile applications and digital media.

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Alive

vISIONOur vision is to enrich the lives ofour customers. Our obsession is to win customers for life through

exceptional experience.

Inclusive

Respectful

OUr SErvIcESOUr WINNINg StrAtEgy

Win through go-to-market excellence

Win with a brilliant network experience

Win with valuable customers

Win with people

PrIOrItIES

OBjEctIvESGrow market share profitably.

Accelerate non-mobile businesses.

vAlUESThe Airtel Core Values expound

on how we aim to embrace responsible business practices

at the workplace, and howwe intend to fulfil our

commitments.

We are alive to the needs of

our customers. We act with

passion energy and a can-do

attitude to help our customers

realise their dreams.

Airtel is for everyone-we

champion diversity, recognising

the breadth and depth of the

communities we serve. We work

with them, anticipating, adapting

and delivering solutions that

enrich their lives.

We live the same lives as

customers, sharing the same

joys and the same pains. We

never forget that they are

why we exist. We act with due

humility and honesty to achieve

mutual respect.

12kEy PErfOrMANcE INdIcAtOr

2016-17

931

79

198139

95.3

8.69

23.39

53.4

126.7

4.28

2.16

279

2400+

2015-16

575

154097162046

-

85126

95.6

9.2

24.3

-

122.0

6.0

2.3

309

1700 +

2014-15

146539

82

-

55762

94.2

9.2

24.3

107.6

453

8.4

2.5

256

1700 +

2013-14

138755

-

-

48543

86.7

9.6

22.7

93.8

206

12.7

2.7

208

2000 +

2012-13

133778

91

-

44523

86.7

10

21.7

82.9

108

17.2

2.8

138

-

Number of Ruralcustomers (Mn)

Social and community Investment towards Bharti Foundation

(INr millions)

Increasing Reach(No. of Network towers)

community development-(number of children under Bharti foundation Education program)

Mobile Population coverage (% population)

Market Share(% subscribers)

Intensity of carbon Emissions (cO2/tb)

Eliminating diesel Usage (networks diesel consumption in kl/site)

Employee Engagement

Score (%)

gender diversity (% of women)

Average hours of training/employee

Waste Management (e-waste disposal

in tonnes)

Waste Reduction (paper reduction through

e-bills in Mn in mobility and broadband)

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EcONOMIc vAlUE gENErAtEd`875970 Million

`803006 Million Economic value distributed

91.67% Distributed to stakeholders

`203408 MilliongOvErNMENt

(Taxes)

With our unmatched subscriber-base making us India’s leading telecom operator, it’s only right that we give back. One of the most significant contributions of our business is the creation of economic value for our stakeholders.

We do this by creating jobs, paying taxes, contributing to social development, investing in newer technologies, building network infrastructure, and enabling local suppliers, using the revenue we generate.

dIrEct cONtrIBUtIONS

`1246 Million

cOMMUNItIES

(Towards Promotion of Education

and Social Projects)

`7362 MillionSHArEHOldErS

(Dividend)

`55827 MillionlENdErS

(Interest)

`510974 MillionPArtNErS

(Procurement and Services)

`24189 MillionPEOPlE

(Salaries and Benefits)

OUr SErvIcEScrEAtINg

SUStAINABlE EcONOMIc vAlUE

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gENErAtINg EMPlOyMENt• 17491 number of employees.

• Over 110000 associates employed by our partners to provide customer service, distribution, run our network infrastructure, and manage our office facilities.

INvEStINg IN BUIldINg INfrAStrUctUrE• Over 336700 base stations.• Over 72000 base stations deployed in 2016-2017.• `165924 Million invested in building network infrastructure.

• Our commitment to invest `600000 Million in network infrastructure

SUPPOrtINg tHE UNdErPrIvIlEgEd• Over 198000 children under the Bharti Foundation Education program• Over 4800 employees participated in the Company’s matched giving programme, A Caring Touch.

ENABlINg dIgItAl INdIA• Connecting over 288 Million customers in over 7800 towns and over 785000 villages• Over 3.8 Million farmers are benefitting through our mobile based agriculture awareness initiative - IkSl

INdIrEct cONtrIBUtIONS

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AT AirTeL, sustainability doesn’t come after business. It is a way of business. Sustainable development and responsible business practices are embedded in our mainstream business agenda, and reflect in our core brand essence of “enriching lives”.

We will actualize our sustainability vision of social inclusion of people everywhere and contribute to a sustainable future, while decoupling this growth without environmental fallout and increasing the social impact. Sustainability for us is exceeding our customers expectations, enabling the communities we work in, attract and retain the best talent and supporting a shift to a low carbon economy thus reducing operational cost and making our business more sustainable. Our objective therefore is to continue being a profit oriented business model and at the same time reduce the impact on the environment, enable our people and suppliers and create a positive impact on the communities we operate in.

OUrAPPrOAcH

Industry benchmarking

Revalidation of material issues

Integrating sustainability into business priorities

Identification of risks

and opportunities

Internal and external stakeholder engagement

OUr SUStAINABIlIty StrAtEgy

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Ascertain Stakeholder Perspective

Identify Material Issues

OUr StAkEHOldEr ENgAgEMENt

MEtHOdOlOgydevelop Strategies and Targets

Map Business Priorities

StAkEHOldEr ENgAgEMENt ANd

MAtErIAlIty rEvIEW

Monitor and Improve

our susTAinABiLiTy sTrATegy is focused on our

most significant or ‘material’ issues. We define materiality by the degree to which an issue is aligned with our business, the potential impact on our operations and the importance of an issue to our key stakeholders.

We consider the materiality process as a dynamic journey of continuous improvement and a useful tool towards development of our sustainability strategy. We engage with our stakeholders in an active dialogue about sustainability in all the communities in which we work, and we use the feedback in developing our products and operations. This engagement considers a broad list of potential issues both within and outside our direct control and is conducted through a detailed survey, as well as one-on-one discussions with all stakeholder groups.

60000+* PArtNErS

372 Mn* cUStOMErS

198347* SHArEHOldErS

22815* EMPlOyEES

OUr StAkEHOldErS

*Globally

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SUStAINABIlIty gOvErNANcE StrUctUrE ANd AccOUNtABIlItIES

The Board of Directors (‘the Board’) represents the core of our corporate governance practices and oversees the working of the management in the best interests of our stakeholders across the world. The CSR committee of the Board, supported by the CEO led Airtel Management Board (AMB), reviews the Company’s business responsibility performance twice a year, supervises and supports its initiatives, and shares growth management activities. AMB, is responsible for overseeing the performance and providing a strategic approach to the Company’s Sustainability & CSR initiatives and is in turn supported by a cross-functional Core Sustainability Group. This group, led by a dedicated Sustainability Officer, and comprising of nominees from across all functions, drives the implementation of strategy and policy across Airtel, and puts the sustainability framework in motion.

the stakeholders expectations were mapped to our business priorities which resulted in the following materiality matrix:

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Sustained community developmentCapitalizing on our ability to contact the deepest reaches of the country to work with the community, grow together and help local communities, in various facets like inclusive growth, governance, economy, security and disaster relief.

• Building Connectivity

• Driving Innovations

• Enabling Community

Win with PeopleCreating an environment that reflects our values of being Alive, Inclusive and Respectful, and allows a person to grow individually as well as drive the vision and mission of the organization.

• Building a high performance culture through embedding the Talent First Strategy

• Creating an inclusive and diverse workforce

• Developing a safe, healthy and ethical work culture

• Building enduring partner relationships

Protecting our PlanetTaking a responsible approach towards the environment by maximizing and facilitating a low-carbon economy, along with sustained efforts in developing green solutions for a better future.

• Reducing the impact of telecom infrastructure on the environment

• Reducing the carbon footprint in our operations

• Resource and waste optimization

Enhancing customer ExperienceProviding our customers with best in class telecommunication products and services, and enhancing their experience at every stage of interaction to build enduring customer relationships.

• Enhancing customer experience through exemplary customer service

• Enabling our customers through digitization and innovative services offerings

• Protecting customer interests, privacy and data security

The 4 signifcant material themes that have emerged through this

exercise, managed and monitored through our approach to sustainability are-enhancing customer experience, sustainable community development, protecting our planet and empowering people.

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OUr vISION

OUr vAlUES

Win through Go to Market Excellence

Alive Inclusive Respectful

Win with a Brilliant Network Experience

To enrich the lives of our customers

Win with valuable customers

Win with a War on Waste

Win with People

OUr BUSINESS PrIOrItIES

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usto

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Ex

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Prot

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Empo

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Peop

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OUr SUStAINABIlIty PIllArS

ALIGNING SUStAINABIlIty WItH OUr OrgANIzAtIONAl

vAlUES, vISION ANd BUSINESS PrIOrItIES

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AIrtEl SUStAINABIlIty PlAN 2020

vISION PIllArS Of SUStAINABIlIty

APPrOAcH ActION PIllArS

SUStAINABlE cOMMUNIty dEvElOPMENt

ENHANcINgcUStOMErExPErIENcE

The underlying belief at Airtel is that the digital world should be open to all. Therefore, we are committed to reducing the didgital gap, with the aim of creating a platform where no person, service or information is too remote.

The backbone of our digital inclusion strategy is comprised of our highly efficient and impenetrable network infrastructure as well as our far reaching distribution. Ongoing investments in innovative technologies and applications backed by products and solutions that further create value for customers and society form the key pillars.

Our culture is to keep our customers at the heart of everything we do. This reflects as one of our core focus areas, ‘Win with Valuable Customers.’ We strive to enhance their experience with us and build a lasting relationship to thier needs and proactively improving the quality, delivery and reliability of our products and services. We ensure that we keep enriching the lives od our diverse customers through a world class seamless netwrok experience, a rich and simplified service channel, and innovative yet cost effcetive customised services to meet the expectations of our diverse customer base.

• Connecting India through deep network penetration.

• Creating adaptability for data and use of the internet.

• Supporting the initiatives of the Bharti Foundation, as well as our regional initiatives to bring about sustainable community development.

• Supporting all disaster relief efforts.

• Building a robust customer experience management system and solutions.

• Building transparency and reduces surprises.

• Building a safe network.

• Protecting customer interests, privacy, and data security.

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PrOtEctINgOUr PlANEt

EMPOWErINgPEOPlE

Our environment strategy reflects the main focus on our investment and effort, concentrating on maintaining our drive to reduce the environmental impact throughout our value chain. We invest in technologies that are continually setting new standards in energy efficiency and environmental performance across our company’s network infrastructure, facilities and technological centres. Over the past few years, we have been constantly optimising our energy sources and green IT solutions like paperless documentation and electronic channels in our operations. More importantly, we feel that it is our responsibility to optimise and manage, our resources and waste, and establish effective recycling capabilities.

We acknowledge that our success depends on the skills, knowledge and passion of all our people, therefore, our people strategy ‘win with people’ has been anchored on a critical pillar, called, ‘Talent First’, encapsulating aspects like:

a. building a high performance culture,

b. building employee capabilities to deliver and grow, and

c. enabling an effective cross-functional work culture.

• Reducing the negative impact of telecom infrastructure by:

• Deploying renewable energy solutions

• Implementing energy efficient technologies and mangement systems

• Reducing the negative impact of our operations.

• Optimising resources and managing waste responsibly.

• Building a diverse and engaged workforce.

• Building a sense of ownership and co-creation.

• Building leaders through succession planning and fostering seamless cross-functional collaboration.

• Building a learned and capable workforce.

• Building collaborative relationships.

• Building a healthy and safe workplace.

AIrtEl SUStAINABIlIty PlAN 2020

vISION PIllArS Of SUStAINABIlIty

APPrOAcH ActION PIllArS

We believe in our strength of a diverse, vibrant, and inclusive workforce, which helps us deliver a delightful experience to our customers to help achieve our vision of enriching their lives.

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Launched 3G and 4G services in all circles with 3G covering

71% of the population

Broadband coverage in

over 7600 towns and

460000 villages

1.5 Mn retail outlets and over

2800 own retail stores

Benefitted over 3.8 million farmers through IKSL

Payments Bank launched in all

29 states

198000 children under Bharti Foundation Education Program

Enabling communitySupporting the efforts of Bharti Foundation to promote quality

education; and driving disaster-relief and community initiatives through

our circles.

Our focus Areas

Building connectivityConnecting everyone, especially

the population in rural areas.

driving InnovationsBuilding technology solutions to address the need for basic life services such as health,

education, financial inclusion and agriculture.

Highlights fy 2016-17

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the Telecom industry is leading our world into a new age, which

was considered impossible just 30 years ago, creating a truly connected, networked

world, thus improving governance, building awareness, fostering communication, as well as contributing to the overall strengthening of the sociocultural ethos. Access to affordable high speed Internet is a powerful tool for economic development and empowerment of populations, particularly in emerging economies like India. As India’s leading telecommunication service provider, Airtel has been making focused efforts to ensure value creation and sustainable growth that impacts our customers, partners, communities and society to grow together and inclusively. Airtel has empowered millions across the length and breadth of the country through its exhaustive bouquet of innovative services and products that enhance community life and e-governance, by working with the communities and increasing its network reach.

This was made possible by our 17000+ workforce and over

100000 people working with our business partners and directly

or indirectly servicing our widespread distribution channels, spread

across 1.5 Mn outlets and 162046 towers, spread across 7893 census towns and 785494 non-census towns and villages in India,

serving approximately 95.3% of the country’s population.

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Continuing its ambitious journey to chart a new course in the

telecom industry, Airtel has made remarkable progress in its commitments for comprehensive network transformation program. Airtel’s smartphone network – the compelling choice across multiple attributes of coverage, capacity and network experience. Our efficient network coverage, deep internet penetration and vast distribution have helped us rapidly advance towards attaining these goals.

Launched In November 2015, “Project Leap”, is Airtel’s aspirational nationwide network transformation program to build a future ready network by committing an investment of `600000 Mn over three years. The size of the task itself challenged the very fundamentals of Indian telecom industry. The execution required a seamless partnership with all our vendors and very meticulous and exact planning. Most of the sites planned were mobile broadband sites and required powerful future ready internet backbone through optical fibre. All the activity including radio and transport planning, installation, fibre/MW availability, media readiness etc had to be done in close coordination across India.

BUIldINg cONNEctIvIty

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In fy 2016-2017

In year 2016-17, Airtel along with its network infrastructure partners deployed over 72000 network base stations in addition to the already functional sites of around 270000.

• 80% of the sites launched in 2016-17 were high-speed broadband sites.

• Acquired 173.8 Mhz spectrum across 1800/2100/2300 MHz bands for over `140000 Mn totalling to more than `700000 Mn in the last 3 years thus securing spectrum requirements for the next 20 years.

• Increased coverage of 3G to all telecom circles across India impacting more than 71% of population.

• Increasing coverage of high speed broadband to over 7893 towns and 785494 villages.

• Launching 4G services in all circles – with TD & FD in 18 circles.

• To ensure world class indoor experience, launched the high speed V Fiber technology across India and platinum 3G on 900 MHz in 4 telecom circles

• In the last 2 years we have almost doubled our transmission capabilities with more than 35000 km of incremental fiber rolled out last year in addition to around 250000 Rkm of domestic and international fiber creating a powerful backbone for data and internet services in additional to voice services.

• Massive upgrades of the transport network with ip-fication of more than 50% of regional network and forklifting the capabilities to 100 Gbps carriage ensured that multifold growth of traffic is handled with ease

• Implementing first dual carrier 3G implementation to achieve a speed of 42 Mbps in across 5 telecom circles

• Implemented carrier aggregation with commercial devices to achieve a speed of 135 Mbps.

Leading the 4G footprint in India

Aspiring to be the pivot of the 4G revolution in India, Bharti Airtel has been at the forefront of technological innovation, providing best in class experience to its customers with its widespread 4G footprint. Rolling out 3G/4G services has been a top priority for the team over the past year. Airtel now has 3G and 4G services in all circles with 3G covering 71% of the population, giving it an unmatched mobile broadband footprint across India.

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Airtel Brings connectivity to this remote village

An example of Airtel’s commitment towards rural connectivity, Airtel brought connectivity for the first time to a population of 5000 people in a village despite lack of commercial viability, tough mountain terrain and uneven topography.

Building our Network Strength

With a network presence covering 7893 census towns and 785494 non-census towns and villages, at present, Airtel deploys more than 300 switching and routing centers processing more than 1339 Bn minutes of voice, and more than 733.1 Bn MBs of data traffic. These are picked up from over 336773 2G, 3G & 4G base stations and carried over more than 250000 Rkm of national optical backbone along with undersea cable network, every month.

47359

Investment in Network Infrastructure Procurement (INR Mn)

Investment in Spectrum Purchase (INR Mn)

87373

138369

165924

128618

353015

fy 2013-14 fy 2014-15 fy 2015-16 fy 2016-17

160346

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It is widely acknowledged across the world that internet accessibility is vital for enhancing socio-economic well-being. The Government of India, through its ‘Digital India’ initiative, is focusing on preparing a comprehensive framework for transforming India’s economy into a digitally empowered society and knowledge economy. The key objective of the initiative is to help elevate the life of the common citizen in multiple ways and in a cost-effective manner. To support the efforts of the Government and to drive the pursuit of digital inclusion, rural connectivity is one of the major focus areas at Airtel.

With over 126 Mn mobile customers from rural market, Airtel serves India’s largest rural mobile customer base. The rural and emerging markets constitute over 48% of our customer base and it is our constant endeavor to develop tailor-made services and systems to cater to the dynamic requirements of our diverse subscriber base.

• 68843 Airtel service centers to serve rural population

• 10104 rural Airtel Express outlets

• 13 rural contact centers with over 3800 employees to provide customised solutions to our rural customers.

Our far reaching distribution network compensates our network reach to provide a one-stop-shop solution for all the services offered including mobile services, broadband, Direct to Home (DTH) and Airtel’s Payment Bank. We operate an omni-channel distribution network with over 19,600 channel partners, 1,532,501 retailers, 53,517 feet-on-street executives and over 650 own retail stores and over 2500 franchise stores across almost 400 cities.

developing our far-reaching distribution Network

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Mobile telephony is paving the way for an unparalleled digital empowerment for

millions of people in India. The availability of smartphone devices, tablets and consumer-friendly data tariffs and applications is driving internet penetration across urban, semi-urban and even rural areas.

We always envisage looking beyond the need of the hour and pioneering the change in the digital landscape by aligning our strategies and strengthening our innovative core. We leverage our mobile, DTH and broadband platforms to enhance the reach of basic life services such as financial inclusion, build awareness around education, health, agriculture to the remotest corners of the country. In addition to this we have been actively partnering with governments and institutions in driving the agenda of development and e-governance in India.

ENABlEr fOr fINANcIAl INclUSION: AIrtEl PAyMENtS BANk

india, with more than 1.3 Billion people is among the fastest growing economies, however, the banking penetration in the rural hinterlands of the country is still low with around 35% bank branches serving 65-70% of the population. Due to limited banking penetration, large parts of the country are still under served and have had very limited exposure to formal banking. With banking mostly catering to urban and semi-urban geographies, a strong need to take banking services to rural parts of the country has been observed.

PrOvISION Of INNOvAtIvE

SErvIcES

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To contribute to the Government’s vision of Financial Inclusion and Digital India and to drive Airtel’s commitment financial inclusion and banking for all, Airtel Payments Bank Ltd, India’s first Payments Bank, commenced its operations nationally in January 2017 with services now active in all 29 States of India. The bank aims to take banking services to the last mile in a quick and efficient manner and benefit millions of unbanked citizens.

The primary objective of Airtel Payments Bank, has been to provide an uncomplicated banking experience to its customers and enjoy products which are intuitive, easy to use and easily accessible.

Multilingual USSD and IVR interfaces allowing non smartphone users to conveniently avail banking services.

More than 250,000 Banking Points to grow to 600,000 in coming months with deep penetration.

“Airtel Payments Bank, India’s first payments bank commenced its operations nationally on 12th january 2017.”

Free personal Accidental Insurance of `100000 with every savings account.

Some of the key features of the bank include:

Value added benefits like interest rate of 7.25% p.a. on deposits in savings accounts, one of the highest in India and mobile number as the account number.

Instant and paperless account opening with Aadhar based biometric verification.

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• drive Airtel’s 288 Mn customers towards digital payments. Leverage Airtel’s existing base of more than 288 Mn customers and popularize the benefits of digital payments with most of the airtel mobile customers.

• Promoting digital payments using non smart phones – Educate non-smartphone customers on USSD and IVR (voice response mechanism) modes for doing cashless transactions for their purchases in more than 12 languages.

• Partnering to drive a culture of digital payments to drive a habit of paying digitally for commonly used services. Airtel is working with multiple organizations to enable digital transaction services used by masses.

• develop a nationwide digital payment ecosystem through partnering with over 1.5 Mn merchants including grocery stores, chemists, small restaurants through a paperless process thus enabling them to start accepting payments instantaneously using either an app (smartphone) or USSD (feature phone).

• Leverage technology to develop simplified payments modes like QR code, OTP and IVR based payments are also being enabled to offer the customers a wide range of transaction modes as per their need.

With a commitment to invest over INr 30000 Mn, Airtel Payments Bank is expected to scale up to 600,000 banking points - more than total branches and ATMs across the country. With this Airtel Payments Bank aims to take basic banking services to the doorstep of every Indian.

In addition to this, Airtel Payments Bank has initiated following steps to help rapidly digitize payments:

Bringing Banking closer to Home

In the last few months of the launch, Airtel Payments Bank has been building an ecosystem for digital payments in over 1,000 villages across various states in India.

Through this intiative, Airtel has opened a minimum of one Airtel Payments Bank outlet in these villages, enabled and partnered with local merchants including farmers and small artisans to accept digital payments and educated the customers to transact digitally.

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Bharti Airtel empowers and reaches out to more than four million farmers, contributing significantly to their crop productivity and incomes. Through its IKSL initiative, which is the joint venture between the Company and the world’s largest fertilizer cooperative - IFFCO, the Company harnesses the power of telecom to add value to the agriculture sector and empower the rural farmer by giving him access to vital information, which will enhance his livelihood and quality of life. The initiative empowers the farmers by providing them with crucial and timely information on weather, commodity prices, agronomy, horticulture, and government schemes among others.

IFFCO Kisan App, a one-stop informational portal with end to end solutions for rural India with specific services on agriculture & allied practices (field to market). This app enables farmers by providing agriculture related alerts, crop prices, weather forecast and agriculture advisories in 11 Indian languages in text as well as agriculture audio clip for the convenience of the farmers who are most comfortable in their own language. The services covered are provided below:

EMPOWErINg AgrIcUltUrE tHrOUgH IffcO kISAN SANcHAr lIMItEd (IkSl)

IffcO kisan Agriculture App data driven Services for Progressive farmers

• Benefitted over 3.8 Mn farmers till date.

• Over 239000 farmers were enrolled in FY 2016-17 across 18 states.

• Over 1.9 Mn farmers have benefitted by accessing IKSL’s Push Voice (OBD) content in FY 2016-17.

• With an expert panel strength of 44, and 36 content developers, IKSL helps address more than 216 customised messages per month and over 152800 helpline farmer queries annually.

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Kisan Call Centres (KCCs) were launched by the Ministry of Agriculture to harness the potential of Information and Communications Technology (ICT) in agriculture. This initiative was aimed at answering farmers’ queries over a telephone call, in their own language/dialect. IFFCO Kisan Sanchar Limited (IKSL) was selected by the Department of Agriculture and Cooperation (DAC), Ministry of Agriculture (MOA), Government of India, to manage KCC services.

At present, KCC services are managed from fourteen locations. With improved services and increased awareness amongst farmers, our call centres handled over 8.7 Mn calls during FY 2016-17.

kisan call centre Services

IKSL is deepening its engagement in rural areas through progressive farmers designated as Kisan Bandhus. Kisan Bandhus are farmers who lead a group of 15-20 farmers within their community and act as an information hub for fellow farmers. Kisan Bandhus help the farmers in their groups, to strengthen their income-generating activities by disseminating the information provided by IKSL. Kisan Bandhus also provide IKSL with any specific requirements of their farmer groups for creating community-specific content.

Project Jeevika started in the month of July 2016 with an objective of providing timely and relevant information to JEEVIKA Self Help Group (SHG) members, on crops and their other livelihood. With this project thousands of SHG members were provided with the source of information in the form of “Green Sim Card” across six districts of Bihar. Approx 53% of the people adopted the different technologies (E.g. SRI Adoption, Soil testing, Seed treatment as suggested, Cultivation of early varieties etc).

Working with Self Help Groups in Bihar

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After expressing concern over pest control for his crop, Harekrishna Prusty from Odisha, was advised to spray a low cost chemical to eliminate the pests. As a result, he was able to successfully farm an additional eight acres and increased his net income by `8,600 per acre.

IMPrOvEd crOP yIEld ANd INcrEASEd INcOME

Instead of relying on middlemen to obtain the pricing for soyabeans, Bapurao More from Maharashtra, acquired from the service, the price at which they were being sold at a nearby market. As a result, he earned `150 more per quintal (equal to 100 kgs) sold for his crop.

AccUrAtE MArkEt PrIcES tO EArN MOrE frOM crOP SAlE

After listening to a message on weather forecasting, Rajender Singh from Haryana was advised that he should delay spraying his crop due to impending rains. Spraying before the rains would have meant the loss of `350 for each of his 15 acres, or `5,250 total.

WEAtHEr INfOrMAtION tO PrEvENt cOStly WAStAgE

Experiencing an extremely low crop yield in 2013, Ranjit Singh from Himachal Pradesh sought help from the Green SIM helpline. He spent `500 to receive guidance regarding the wheat varieties he should plant to boost production. With the information gained and applied, Ranjit experienced an income increase of `21,000, achieving a profit of `20,500.

INfOrMEd PlANtINg tO PrEvENt lOW crOP yIEldS

success storiesgreen siM users have enjoyed many benefits since the implementation of this initiative.

These farming successes can be categorized as: prevention of crop loss, increased profit from crop sales through informed pricing, boost in agricultural production, and enabling better, more cost-effective use of farming tools such as insecticides and healthy diets for livestock

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Airtel understands that formal education is still restricted in many parts of India and has been using technology enabled platforms to bridge the gap. Airtel m-Education has been designed to replicate a classroom experience for its customers and enable learning at a convenient, accessible and affordable platform. Airtel mobile customers across the country are provided access to a host of education services including courses for language skills, entrance exam preparation and career counselling from the best of universities and professors in the country with just a few clicks on their mobile phones.

The healthcare sector is another area which lacks in terms of infrastructure and professionals

in the country. In response to this, Airtel’s m-Health service is aimed at monitoring fetal and child mortality, ensuring better medical facility to the expecting mother, fetus and the child in rural India which lacks proper health facilities. In addition to this, the application provides last mile integration thus helping the Health Department implement an accurate field information system and assist the management to take accurate and informed decisions.

It offers a 360-degree view of public health initiatives by identifying ground-level health risks, enabling live interventions by doctors, and tracking field performance for improved operations.

PrOMOtINg HEAltH ANd EdUcAtION AWArENESS

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PArtNErINg IN gOvErNMENt INtIAtIvES tO drIvE dEvElOPMENt ANd E gOvErNANcE

Airtel strongly believes that promoting e-Governance in India is crucial to promote

inclusive growth of all sections of the society. Airtel is supporting various initiatives of the

government under the Digital India Program to transform the entire ecosystem of public services through the use of information technology, with the vision to transform India into a digitally empowered society and knowledge economy.

designing the next generation UP Police emergency management system-UP100

Airtel has been a critical implementation partner in the design & development of “UP 100 – Police Emergency Management System”, a one-of-its-kind pioneering initiative that has propelled UP’s position in m-Governance in the country. A 24x7 integrated system, UP 100, is citizen centric initiative that now allows any citizen in distress to access emergency services from multi-channel modes such as mobile or phone call/email/social media post. Initially functional only within the 6 major districts of UP, this transformation exercise was powered with the help of Airtel’s efficient cloud & network, has helped rollout systems across all 75 district Control rooms, 25 Police Units, 18 ranges of police station, 8 police zones of state & 3200 Mobile Police Control Rooms, allowing for an extensive coverage of emergency services across the state. It’s a one of a kind system that uses LBS (Location Based Services) to track the exact location from where the distress call originated. In areas without network, the system even supports latching on the defence wireless frequency bands for communication.

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driving automation in BPcl operations

Airtel has been a critical implementation partner of BPCL, one of the leading Oil Refining and Marketing companies, in the project of automation of a gas refill booking system. A 24x7 automated IVRS based system has now been implemented across all telecom circles to benefit over 30 million BPCL customers. The automation will remove the need for the customers to go to respective LPG distributor for gas refilling and reduce the time for end to end delivery of the LPG cylinder. The digital transformation has been possible by a single 10 digit number for call and SMS services activated by Airtel for all the telecom circles.

Empowering digital education in Bihar

Airtel, in its role of network rollout partner for BELTRON campus WiFi project, the flagship digital education project of Bihar government, has played a pivotal role in improving access to knowledge by connecting more than 250 colleges on its reliable, scalable & secure internet cloud by March 2017 and plans to extend the connectivity to 50 more colleges in the coming year. These campuses have been enabled with WiFi hotspots for students and visitors alike to securely connect and access the vast library of educational resources within the campus premises, aiding collaboration and research. Establishing a high-speed backbone connectivity with internet speeds as high as 10 MBPS and 20 MBPS in case of research institutes like IIT & NIIT, we have helped enable knowledge and information sharing, thereby linking the students of these government colleges to global education networks to collaborate with research communities across the globe.

Enabling the gSt rollout

Airtel is one of the core members of GSTN, enabling the not-for-profit with the network and data centre infrastructure to build & operate end-to-end functionalities of the front-end GST portal as well as backend IT modules of various Indian states & UT’s for return processing, registration, financial audits, appeals & assessments. It shall be a one-stop-shop for all stakeholders for GST related functions including registration, return, refund and payment system. The GST portal, hosted on Airtel’s infrastructure will standardize the filing process of taxes for all payee types including individuals/SME’s/Corporates. These taxpayers will have a gamut of services to file their taxes and maintain details. The proposed network infrastructure unifies the Tax Offices across states & UT’s in India, and allows parallel processing of State & Central GST. Airtel’s robust network infrastructure shall be supporting 2 million such transactions on an annual basis and ancillary requests related to these as well. This has been made possible through the use of 2 dedicated MPLS with further connectivity to the state networks.

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Bharti Airtel has committed itself towards sustainable development through actively engaging with the communities it operates in.

Our philanthropic efforts, employee volunteerism, and local community outreach initiatives support the desire to be seen as a trusted partner - one that honours its commitments and takes pride in the role it plays in community wellness. It is determined to create a deep-rooted, positive impact on society at large. Therefore, it proactively applies its competence and partnerships to promote development initiatives through initiatives undertaken by Bharti Foundation, the philanthropic arm of Bharti Enterprises, and its own telecom circles at the regional level.

With a vision to help underprivileged children and young people of our country realize their potential, Bharti Foundation is committed to implementing and supporting programs in the fields of primary, elementary, senior secondary and higher education; as well as sanitation and legal assistance to the underprivileged sections of society. Education being its core focus area, Bharti Foundation has been working steadfastly to enable the cognitive, creative and emotional development of students along with instilling values and attitudes of responsible citizenry.

ENABlINg tHE cOMMUNIty

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254 schools in six states

43527 students

49% girls

75% from marginalised communities*

1677 teachers

66% female teachers

The flagship initiative of Bharti Foundation, provides free quality eductaion to underprivileged children with a focus on the girl child, across rural India.

SAtyA BHArtI ScHOOl PrOgrAM

323 Government schools in seven states

124856 students

50% girls

63% from marginalised communities*

5133 teachers

Collaborates with the existing Government system and works towards improving the quality of schooling experience through need-based interventions.

BHArtI fOUNdAtION INtErvENtIONS

SAtyA BHArtI QUAlIty SUPPOrt PrOgrAM

*includes Scheduled Castes/Scheduled Tribes & other backward classes

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270000+ students impacted (since inception)

1700+ school plus centers

11000+ teaching community impacted

1400000+ community members impacted (including sanitation)

3500+ villages impacted

Overall Impact of Bharti foundation

223 operational centres in three states

29756 students impacted

23676 mainstreamed

47% girls

290 education volunteers

942 centres closed

98% from marginalised communities*

• Higher Education Programs

1. Bharti School of Telecommunication

Technology and Management (IIT Delhi)

2. Bharti Centre for Communication (IIT Bombay)

3. Bharti Institute of Public Policy

• Satya Bharti Abhiyan

• Nyaya Bharti

OtHEr INItIAtIvES

Partners with the Government in setting up centres to enroll and mainstream ‘Out of School’ Children (OOSC).

0

50

100

150

200

42,857

fy 12-13

Number of children under Bharti foundation’s Education programs

Number of children under Bharti Foundation Education program

Num

ber

of c

hild

ren

fy 13-14 fy 14-15 fy 15-16 fy 16-17

48,543

55,762

85,126

198,139

SAtyA BHArtI lEArNINg cENtrE PrOgrAM

132% increase in the last one year

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With a special focus on the welfare, education and empowerment of the girl child, Bharti Foundation has developed a 4E approach.

These four ‘E’s create the groundwork for Empowerment - through knowledge, skill building, engagement and enablement leading to enthusiasm, taste for success and self-belief. Girl Child friendly processes are ensured in schools through our Community Outreach, Adolescent Education and Safety norms tied to Gender Sensitivity programs.

Environment around girls; be it schools, the community, her parents, teachers or peers to be safe and conducive

Enrolment a logical follow up to Environment, making sure the girl child enrols for education.

Education because an educated girl is an empowered girl, with more oppurtunities to fulfil her aspirations.

Encouragement Satya Bharti Schools encourage girls to express themselves, believe in their potential and follow their dreams. The initiatives that ensure inclusion include recognition of all-round girl performers on the basis of both academic and non-academic activities. Further, the leadership and participation of girl students is actively promoted in external contests and events. Girls have emerged as agents of change and regularly receive accolades for their community campaigns under the prestigious Design for Change Awards, Pramerica Spirit of Community Awards, etc. Finally, the inclusive processes of the Schools’ Student Leadership Council ensures equal representaion of girls as student leaders.

Launched in 2006, the Satya Bharti School Program recently completed 10 successful years. It is one of the largest rural education initiatives in India. The initiative aims to provide quality education for free, to underprivileged children in rural India with a special focus on the girl child. The program ensures the provision of quality education through well-trained teachers, appointed from the surrounding communities. The objective is to develop students into self-reliant individuals with a deep sense of social commitment. The structured program approach also includes various welfare schemes such as provision of free uniforms, study materials, mid-day meals, etc.

Giving wings to their dreams

Focusing on the girl child

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Promoting Holistic development Beyond Academics

Holistic development remains a core integral part of the Satya Bharti School Curriculum. The aim is to ensure child development appropriate to age and grade; in order to transform the children into educated, employable and responsible citizens of tomorrow, with a sense of commitment to the communities in which they live. Building on this component, the curriculum incorporates interaction of the students with the society through community campaigns in the school’s vicinity. They are encouraged to identify issues prevalent in their communities, sensitize the villagers and create a socially aware society, which is free from the dogmas that hinder development and inclusivity. In the past years, students have successfully led campaigns on issues like girl child education, substance abuse, environment awareness, caste discrimination etc. This approach helps each child to participate wholly while simultaneously exploring individual creativity and developing the ability to investigate. These campaigns have also garnered national and international laurels at multiple award platforms.

cleanliness drive by the School children

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community campaigns Led by the children

Community volunteering is an initiative under the Satya Bharti School program. Under this initiative, the schools engage with the villagers through a Community Volunteering week, which is organized annually during the summer break. Community members take over the role of teachers to share their know how about local art, crafts, folklore and other activities that are unique to their region; thus ensuring that students stay rooted to their culture.

community volunteering Program

In FY 2016-17, 1411 volunteers participated across India, who engaged with over 39000 students.

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AgENtS Of cHANgE

“ I can write and I can read,

tomorrow I will lead”

“I am proud to spread the message of sanitation

learnt at school in my community”

-Alisha

Student, Satya Bharti Learning Centre, Jitko (Jharkhand)

-jannat

Student, Satya Bharti School, Udharsi, Kurukshetra (Haryana)

Alisha was forced to drop out from her school to support the meager income of her family. A girl who had no hope of an education, today dreams of becoming a teacher and spreading the light of knowledge in her remote village thanks to the effort of dedicated education volunteers and is now mainstreamed after a long gap in education.

Spreading the importance of sanitation in rural communities

Supporting the “Beti Padhao and Beti Bachao campaign”

Jannat, the 10 year old change ambassador was concerned about the safety and health risks associated with open defecation after her lesson on hygiene and sanitation. Her determination enabled her to convince the Sarpanch to pledge funds from a Government scheme and provide villagers free building materials to construct a toilet in their home.

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Jyoti Yogi, made the benefits of government “Ujjwala Yogna” available to her entire community and led the transformation to LPG cylinders and replaced unclean cooking fuels used!

“it is great to see my mother and other women of my community breathe

clean air inside and outside our homes”

-jyoti yogi

Alumnus, Satya Bharti Upper Primary School, Gunavata, Amer (Rajasthan)

Geeta’s efforts have brought change in a community cursed with child marriage. She dared to lead a door-to-door campaign by bringing together other girls facing child marriage. Together they created awareness about the benefits of educating a girl child rather than imposing child marriage on her.

“My fight against child marriage is

a fight for my community”-geeta devi

Student, Satya Bharti Elementary School, Balial, Sangrur (Punjab)

Standing firm against child marriage

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• Bharti Foundation led Satya Bharti learning Centres enrol and mainstream Out Of School Children (OOSC) in 1165 villages

• 29756 OOSC have been directly impacted till date

• Around 23676 OOSC who appeared for the Government Assessment have been mainstreamed into their age appropriate grades

• 98% OOSC belong to marginalised communities (SC/ST/OBC); 47% are girl students

• 290 local youth employed as Education Volunteers (EVS)

Bharti Foundation energizes over 1000 Government Schools

Airtel’s Contribution to Bharti Foundation (` Mn)

0

400

200

600

800

1000

fy 12-13 fy 13-14 fy 14-15 fy 15-16 fy 16-17

108206

453575

931

`(M

n)

The Satya Bharti Learning Centre Program focuses on Out of School Children (OOSC) in close coordination with Government Schools. In partnership with Educate a Child (EAC) under the global initiative launched by Her Highness Sheikh Mozah Bint Nasser of Qatar, the program was initiated with an aim to guide Out of School Children back into schools by identifying, enrolling and providing them bridge courses to bring them to an age/class appropriate level. The program approach is to establish a Learning Centre within a classroom provided in a selected Government School. In addition, Mid-Day Meals, textbooks and condensed courses (special training modules) are provided by the Government. The Out of School Children are identified through community surveys administered by trained Education Volunteers. These Education Volunteers also undertake special teaching/training for the identified children, fortify learning with usage of innovative Teaching Learning Material, provide age-appropriate mainstreaming and undertake community mobilisation activities. The other implementing partners for this project are ‘Humana People to People India’, ‘Education Support Organization (Gyan Shala) and ‘Educate Girls.’

Over 60% increase in contribution over the last year

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Satya Bharti Abhiyan – driving Sanitation

On 18th August 2014, Bharti Foundation launched the Satya Bharti Abhiyan, an initiative to improve sanitation facilities with rural Ludhiana as a focus area. Phase I of the program has been completed with 17,500+ individual toilets constructed and handed over across rural Ludhiana. In addition, 14 Government schools, identified by Punjab Education Development Board, have been provided a separate toilet for girls. In its second phase, the program is being ramped up to urban areas of Ludhiana to support the district administration’s efforts.

Nyaya Bharti -

‘Nyaya Bharti’ is a one-of-its-kind corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiative in India. The primary objective of Nyaya Bharti is to provide aid to the underprivileged undertrials who are first time offenders accused of petty offences, requiring legal/financial assistance for release on bail. It also extends assistance to certain poor first time convicts undergoing imprisonment for petty offences due to their inability to pay petty fines imposed by the courts. The Governing Board of Nyaya Bharti is headed by Justice (Dr.) A.S. Anand, former Chief Justice of India.

The Nyaya Bharti initiative aims at providing legal assistance and promoting awareness amongst the undertrials’ about their legal rights. Nyaya Bharti through its endeavours, complements the legal aid work being undertaken by National Legal Services Authority (NALSA) and State Legal Services Authorities (SLSAs), set up under statute legislated by the Parliament.

The office of Nyaya Bharti is located in New Delhi. Under this initiative 43 bail orders have been obtained and gross release of 38 underprivileged undertrials has been affected.

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in addition to our dedicated efforts directed at supporting the activities of Bharti Foundation, Airtel itself is also involved in numerous pursuits that address local and regional concerns. Airtel’s relentless efforts aimed at fostering sustainable community development come in varied forms. Whether it’s donating a part of salary, time, skills or knowledge to the employee giving programme (ACT) or running for a cause to raise funds in the Airtel Delhi Half Marathon (ADHM) or assisting in natural disasters, our employees constantly reach out by volunteering, raising funds for charitable causes, donating blood, and creating awareness about important issues across the country.

cOMMUNIty dEvElOPMENt By OUr rEgIONAl OffIcES

disaster relief

• Employee vounteering and donations

• Upkeeping of our network and provision of free calls

Environment and Health

• Tree plantation

• Awareness drives

• Blood donation

• Health and eye donation camps

• Create social awareness

community Engagement

• Support to under privileged kids and old age homes

• Assistance in self employment of the physically challenged

• Drives for the eradication of social evils

Promote Art, Sports and culture

• Promoting local sports events

• Promoting local artists

• Organizing local marathons to bring communities together

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The devastating Vardah cyclone in December 2016 wreaked havoc in several parts of Tamil Nadu. Our Network Team worked round the clock on a war footing to keep the services running. Many of our team members stayed back and carried out restoration work in all affected sites. Similarly, during the demise of the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister, we strengthened our vigil. We joined hands with the law enforcing authorities and ensured zero interruptions across the state. Additional Mobile COWs/Mobile BTSes

were deployed near the Funeral and Memorial sites to withstand additional traffic.

Majuli in Assam is the largest river island in the world. The island witnessed severe flood last year owing to unprecedented rainfall, which affected the lives of hundreds. Houses were deluged by the heavy downpour. We took no time to reach the spot with our relief materials. People on the island were provided with roofing sheets that protected them from incessant rainfall.

disaster relief

Like every year, we celebrated the Joy of Giving Week (JGW) across different states of the country. Employees at our Rajasthan Circle Office spent the JGW by voluntarily donating to the children of Satya Bharti Foundation. In Bangalore, we partnered with different NGOs and organised an event called ‘Food for Change’. The event was an initiative to help raise funds for the NGOs. Airtel employees, with their families, set up food stalls at a prime location in the city. The money collected from selling the food was donated to the NGOs.

Both the campaigns received overwhelming responses, which motivated us to come up with more such initiatives in the coming days.

joy of giving

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celebration timeA wide range of programmes were organised to engage in the different celebrations that took place in various parts of the country. Our Mysore zone employees celebrated Deepavali at Bhagini Samaj Ashram for Children, where they distributed sweets, crackers and stationery items for the kids. Similarly, our team in Rajasthan celebrated their Diwali with the students of Satya Bharti School. They organised a campaign called ‘Is Diwali kuch alag karte hain’. Under the initiative, the employees contributed stationery items, books, and sports equipment to the students. Employees from Hubli zone dedicated their Holi Celebration to the kids of NGO Child for Home. Whereas, in Mangalore, Children’s day was celebrated by organising a drawing competition for the specially-abled children.

Since Durga Puja is the most awaited festival in West Bengal, we thought of spreading the festivity among everybody. Our team in Bengal hit the streets and took 26 HIV affected children from ‘Anandaghar’ for a Pujo Parikrama. They rejoiced and cherished the entire day visiting different Puja pandals across Kolkata.

Blood donationBlood donation camps were regularly organised at various places, where employees and partners donated blood to help save lives. Fourteen camps were organised across the northeast states and Assam, where 520 units of blood were collected in one day and handed over to government blood banks across 7 Northeastern states. In Rajasthan and Karnataka, our teams arranged camps across all zones partnering with the renowned local hospitals.

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HealthcareIn Karnataka, our Mangalore zone employees visited Aasare, an exclusive home for physically challenged children and distributed fruits and chocolates among kids. Eye check-up camps were also set up across all the five zones in the state, where people came from urban and rural areas to get consultations from doctors, absolutely free of cost.

Everyone in our West Bengal team donated money to provide nutritional supplements to HIV-affected children in ‘Anandaghar’. Together, they collected a sum of `32,000. Additionally, two 24-hour helpline numbers were launched to offer help in cases of paediatric HIV. In Assam, our team spent a day with students of Basistha Blind School in Guwahati.

distributing daily needs As a responsible corporate, we encourage our employees to participate in social welfare. Our team in the Northeast states and Assam collaborated with OJU Welfare Association in Arunachal Pradesh to drive a campaign called ‘Clothes for Charity’, where used clothes were collected from all our offices in that zone and were donated to the association. OJU Welfare Association works for the development and empowerment of the women and children who are lagging behind the mainstream of the society. In Pune as well, our employees collected daily consumables like clothes, shoes, water bottles, soaps, among others and donated those to Maher Ashram in the city.

Bharti Foundation and the University of Cambridge signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on 12 September 2016, with the aim of conducting research on the improvement of the baby corn crop in India. Bharti Foundation utilizes funds donated by Airtel to provide a grant to the University of Cambridge to carry out this three-year long research program between Cambridge’s Department of Plant Sciences and the Cambridge Centre for Crop Science (3CS), Punjab Agricultural University and Field Fresh Food Private Limited.

Partnership with University of cambridge

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The Young Leaders Program is a two-week corporate induction initiative. It encourages new joinees of Bharti Airtel to participate in various initiatives of the Foundation. This year, 43 Young Leaders volunteered at 21 Satya Bharti Schools across Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh. They assisted the teachers in classrooms, trained students in various skills such as communication and leadership and also interacted with communities, during their stint with the Bharti Foundation.

Instilling community Service among young leaders

running for a causeIn addition to being an expression of sporting prowess, marathons are also a platform to raise awareness about various social causes. Since its inception in 2008, Bharti Foundation has been actively associated with the Airtel Delhi Half Marathon (ADHM). The ADHM 2016 witnessed over 1054 employees from Airtel including senior management and over 30 corporate teams run for the Foundation.

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Employee giving Program – A caring touch (Act)A Caring Touch (ACT) is a Bharti Group Employee Philanthropy Program. Employees as well as their families are encouraged to donate their time, skills, knowledge, materials and money, to either Bharti Foundation or any other charity empanelled under ACT. Each monetary donation is matched equally by Bharti Airtel to double the impact on the lives of those less privileged.

As a part of ACT, an Employee Volunteering Programme has been designed that encourages employees of Bharti Airtel to volunteer with the Satya Bharti Schools or a charity of their choice. It actively encourages employees to take a day off from work to volunteer off-site or on-site.

`3.8 Million was contributed towards ACT by our 4800+ employees to Bharti Foundation, and over `5.2 Million by Airtel, resulting in a total contribution of more than `9 Million.

“cONtINUE SHArINg tHE gIft Of jOy ANd QUAlIty EdUcAtION”

Act today And Make A change!

contact your Act Ambassador

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288 Mn customers in India,

repersenting an 8.9% increase over FY 2015-16.

733 TB data usage, which

is a 47.3% increase over FY 2015-16

Over 72000 network base stations added in FY 2016-17 over and above the existing 270000 sites

0.016* complaints per customer

Around 34 Mn customer queries addressed per month by our contact centers

Surveyed around 80000 customers monthly to gauge their feedbacks about our services

18000 exclusive contact center agents across 31 cities to serve our customers

32.7 Mn Aadhar based acquisitions

Call per customer was 0.10* for the FY 2016-17 for mobile customers

Our focus Areas

Providing an exemplary customer service

Enabling our customers through

digitization and innovative services

and offerings

Protecting customer interests,

privacy and data security

* As on March 31st, 2017

Highlights fy 2016-17

57

Communication binds relationships.

As an enabler, our relationship with our 288 million customers is what defines us as a strong network. We are committed to providing our customers with best in class telecommunication products and services. We also strive to build an enduring relationship with them at every stage of our interaction and in the process enhance their overall experience, create transparency and protect their interests.

Every day, through around 3100 Airtel retail stores, and around 1.5 million retail points distributed across 7893 cities and 785494 villages throughout India, we touch the lives of millions of homes, small businesses and large enterprises. Our aim is to simplify the journey of our customers by tailoring it to suit their individualistic needs.

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‘Win with Customers’ is our key business priority. Through our world-class network, innovative yet affordable services, and an exceptional customer experience, we aim to win customers for life a lifetime. Our long-term strategic goal is to innovate and deliver a wide range of cost-effective, secured, timely, and customized services with the best that technology can offer! We actively seek customer feedback, act on it, and improve our customer service and in the process improve our products, services, and processes.

PrOvIdINg ExEMPlAry

cUStOMEr SErvIcE

59

ENHANcINg cUStOMEr SAtISfActION

At Airtel, we believe our customers are also our partners. They help us to greatly improve and evolve the services we offer. Their ongoing feedback is the greatest stimulus in improving our products, services and processes. Through an integrated end to end experience, improving our overall retail store experience, and delivering impeccable voice and internet services, we strive to increase our customer retention. Airtel

relies on various mechanisms such as the Net Promoter Score (NPS), social media mentions, feedback over a call/point of sale, customer grievances, complaint management, and exit surveys to measure customer satisfaction. Holistic tools such as the NPS enable us to gather feedback and ascertain our customers’ experiences.

going an extra mile-working with communities

Connectivity is an inherent aspect of communities which gives Airtel an important role to play in Resident Welfare Associations (RWA’s). We are connecting with communities, giving them varied and customized solutions to provide a seamless network experience.

• Service camps set up in approximately 2700 RWA’s in 80 cities in India

• RWA Buddies appointed & presentations given to residents on network presence, Open Network Portal & future network upgradation plans

• Proactive surveys on pre-identified RWA’s with the help of third party vendor-relevant network solutions suggested & implemented

Enhancing customer experience through faster, paperless and secure onboarding experience

Supporting the Government of India’s Digital India Movement and towards a paperless customer verification process, Airtel launched the e-KYC solution at all its retail stores and point of sales. Customers intending to procure a new mobile connection need to validate their biometric information at the Point of Sale which is real time verified with the Aadhar database and the connection is instantly activated. Over 32 Million customer acquisitioned in FY 2016-17 were Aadhar based.

60

transforming service experience through Airtel own retail stores

Airtel is constantly innovating to meet the customers’ expectations and to offer a superior service experience to our diverse customer base. Over the last year we have worked hard to improve our customers’ in-store experience by reducing wait times, delivering a personalized experience and consistently resolving our customers’ requests in the first instance. It is our constant endeavor to increase efficiency through innovation and ensure the ‘first time right’ experience so customers walk out delighted from our stores.

Over 3000 retail stores across India currently

• Over 650 Company - Owned - Company - Operated (COCO) and over 2500 franchise retail stores opened across India over the last three years

• Over 6500 dedicated Customer Service Executives across 400 cities providing personalized services to customers

• One-stop-shop Airtel stores offering end-to-end service support for Airtel mobile, dongle and broadband connections:

• Enabling attention to service requests and quick complaints redressal

• Enabling customers to experience our products and services to make decision

• Efficiently trained customer service executives to deliver seamless customer interaction

• Over 170000 manhours of functional and competence based trainings delivered to team in FY 2016-17

61

creating personalised touch points for rural customers

In its constant endeavor to localize customer service delivery, Airtel has been providing personalized services to our rural customers, through its 13 rural call centers which have more doubled in the last two years. These centers also help in empowering the communities in which they operate by providing employment to over 3500 rural people.

• 22 Million new mobile customers added this year

• 10 Million social media queries answered

• 150000 (approx) mentions average per month online

• 74% increase in our online interactions from the last year

• 26 Million more customers switched to e-billing over and above the 144 million already enrolled

lIStENINg tO OUr cUStOMErS

We put our customers at the heart of everything we do

and actively seek their views. We see this as an integral part of our plans for a sustainable customer base. We are constantly streamlining and expanding our communication channels to simplify our customers to interactions.

We listen to our customers through various touchpoints:

• Through our 3000+ company-owned and franchise retail stores and over 6500 Customer Relationship Officers in over 400 cities across India

• Online, through www.airtel.in, we currently get over 0.9 Mn hits per day with an average time spent per visit of almost 6 minutes and around 0.8 million customers.

• On social media, through our presence on all leading social media channels, we receive over 4308 mentions and nearly 300000 queries everyday.

• Via phone, customers can opt to call us on over 40 contact centers across 36 cities with over 18000 exclusive agents handling close to 480 million calls every year.

This year

62

the Social command center

In recent times, social media has become one of the most powerful platform for self-expression, connecting people and putting forward your opinion. The Command Center is a hybrid mix of capabilities from brand insights, customer experience and corporate communications to help manage and optimize the social media ecosystem. The Command Center controls:

• Customer Response – Monitoring, responding and resolving cases though a 365, 24x7 running model with a turnaround time of 4 hours for high value customers

• Consumer Crisis Management – The tools and live streams enable us to have a bird’s eye view on various potential crises situations

• Consumer Facing Content – Crunching 900,000 conversations every 30 days enables us to understand what works and engages our target audience

• Competitor Understanding – Keeping a tab on the category and competitor metrics helps us stay ahead of the curve

soCiAL MediA is one of our key communication channels, that was strengthened in 2015, and continues to be important to us. Over the past year, we have made the shift from social listening to social intelligence. We are now using insights for informed engagement, driving content creation, building a community of advocates and taking real time marketing decisions. For Airtel, the command center has become a next-gen customer interaction hub with infinite learning possibilities. We are constantly listening, responding and resolving consumer queries all across social media. Our belief is that customers are most comfortable when expressing themselves on social media platforms and it is that very fact that we want to leverage. While we create conversations on established social media platforms, a big part of what we do is also to ‘manage conversations’ in real time from various stakeholder groups – consumers, media, competition and even policy makers. Digital mediums are increasingly becoming the first port of call for communication and the command center helps us be prepared for the volume and sensitivity.

Building A Social connect

63

Improving quality of Service and Network reliability

QuALiTy of serviCe, in a world of increasingly empowered

customers, is quintessential for building customer loyalty. Being one of the largest backbone network operators worldwide, we strive to build a smart and dynamic network, improving the quality of both voice and data services, and providing an exceptional world-class experience to our customers.

In our endeavor to offer best in class network experience to customers, we have invested over `300 Billion over the past 2 years in adding new base stations and modernizing our network infrastructure. Some of the other initiatives were undertook this year to enhance the network experience of our customers include:

• Granular focus on network quality through clustering – A more focused approach on network quality by creating clusters with clear ownership lead to reduction of key KPIs like call drop, blocking, slow browsing, and in top cities a gain of 70% to 95% was observed across voice and data.

• Project Leap - In 2015, we implemented our network transformation program – Project Leap – aimed at significantly improving our network quality and delivering the best customer experience. One of the key initiatives undertaken through this project involved deployment of over 72000 network base stations in FY 2016-17 across India to ensure an uninterrupted network experience

• Open Network – 2016 saw, Airtel taking the next step in the direction with India’s first Open Network. An open sharing platform that gives everybody access to our tower maps, weak spots, strong signal zones, high-speed internet and more. Airtel with the help of its customers has upgraded 9000+ towers through the Open Network initiative.

• Deployment of innovative tools for near real time optimization through Self Optimization Network (SON) and Geo analytical tools - Self Optimization Network (SON) enabled automation of network optimization to ensure availability of resources as per user demand. It has enabled dynamic configuration of the network for seamless handovers in 3G & 2G network, thus reducing call-drops by more than 35%, network overloading by more than 20% thus improving efficiency of the available spectrum and network capacity.

• Improving efficiency of new deployments by customer demand centric network planning which helped deployment of new sites and small cells in corridors of high consumption.

64

delivering Exceptional Network Experience

The state-of-the-art Network Experience Centre (ANEC) in Manesar is the hub for the command and control of customer perceived service quality parameters, complementing the traditional way of fault and performance monitoring of network which is a paradigm shift from the conventional concept of Network Operations Centre.

The entire network across all product segments is monitored 24x7 and in case of any emergency or glitches, the information is immediately passed on to the concerned operations team, thereby helping to prioritize action to restore normalcy and reduce resolution time.

Our self-regulation of quality of service

Airtel commits to implement a 25% more stringent mobile call drop benchmark of 1.5% versus 2% prescribed by the regulator. As per the new benchmark, Airtel will contribute `100000 for every 0.01% increase in call drop rate beyond 1.5% every month in each circle of operation despite the constraint of difficult operating conditions in some areas, in particular hilly regions.

Airtel dtH walks the talk

• Airtel DTH completes 95% of its installations within four hours of the request.

• 90% of customer complaints are resolved within six hours.

• Under a new ‘express service’, operational in 26 cities, new connections are being installed within two hours of the request.

65

enhAnCed digiTAL TeChnoLogies and need for rapid innovation,

greater convergence and newer services have transformed the way we live and connect. Our customers expect a seamless experience and a high degree of consistency in service delivery and quality, shifting easily between the digital and the physical “point of sale”. As a result, we aim for real-time customer interaction and invest in corresponding technology to stay connected to consumers and improve our customer service, while paying the utmost attention to data privacy and security.

Airtel is among the first Indian telecom companies to enable real digitization of nearly all digital devices, providing a seamless experience to our customers. Airtel’s transformation was inspired by its customers embracing digital services which have been driven by the wide adoption of newer technologies like 4G. We want to win the trust of our customers by provision of personalized experience, end to end self-care, predictive means to meet customer expectations, and self-healing systems backed by an easy interface.

Taking these initiatives to a whole new level, this year Airtel has constantly evolved its array of self-care services in the digital space to empower its customers by helping them manage their Airtel services effortlessly.

ENABlINg OUr cUStOMErS tHrOUgH

dIgItIzAtION ANd INNOvAtIvE SErvIcES

OffErINgS

66

dIgItAlIzINg cUStOMEr ExPErIENcE jOUrNEy 2016-17

fy 2017 Overview

May-2016

jun-2016

jul-2016

Aug-2016

Sep-2016

Oct-2016

jan-2017

Nov-2016

dec-2016

Apr-2016

Building Transparency of our network

JACKPOT

get Surprised, best offers to enhance customer experience Enabling

customers through self care by Simplification of “my plan”

AADHAR BASED ACTIVATION

Instant and paperless digital process that uses biometric device for sim activation in 5 Mins

APPS DIALERBACKUP

One app for all apps - the best of the web under a single interface with a curation of popular apps; free calling through dialer and free backup on cloud

POSTPAID SELFCARE-ONLINEEnhanced self care options for the customers with an improved interface on the web.

launch of India’s first Payments Bank online and integration with the app

STRESSFREE INTERNATIONAL ROAMING

67

My Airtel App - Enabling Self-Service and Building Trust

In FY 2016 – 17 Airtel launched the refreshed and intuitive interface of the ‘MyAirtel App’ for delivering enhanced digital experience. This app in addition to various features mentioned below also offers a unified interface to the entire suite of our popular mobile apps and products offered by Airtel

• Easy to manage all Airtel relationships like mobile broadband DTH with a single relationship

• Building transparency for the customer to track his usage/ plan/unbilled amount in a single interface

• Empowering customers for all transactions including bill payments, plan, tariff and recharges

• Enables customers to avail the customized offers

• Provision of innovative solutions at no extra cost like free Cloud Backup, free calls through Airtel Dialer and Airtel Secure.

Increase in customers preference for online

Use

r in

Mill

ions

Rat

ings

User acceptance of the app (Google Rating)

2015 2016

YEARS

2017

Ranked

29th most visited

Indian website

YEARS

2015 2016 2017

3.7 3

.9 4.3

*

*As on 31st March 2017

0

1

1

2

3

2

3

5

4

150% increase

1.2

1.9

3

68

2006

Our Innovation journey

We Are TouChing The Lives of millions of customers every day with our wide-range of innovative and customized products and services. From being the first in India to introduce music on mobile phones to launching new services like ‘Easy Recharge’, ‘Lifetime Prepaid’ and mobile money, Bharti Airtel has always been at the forefront of introducing path breaking innovations to create a transformational impact on the lives of its customers.

2007

Easy recharge‘Easy Recharge’ a unique and revolutionary prepaid product which enabled prepaid customers to top up their prepaid cards with any value suiting their budget even when they are roaming.

Hello TunesHello Tunes redefined the entire customer’s mobile experience as it enabled the caller dialing Airtel customers to hear songs and other sound clips instead of the traditional ringtone.

lifetime Prepaid This card enabled a customer to receive calls for a lifetime without having to recharge or worry about the validity period of the card.

Song catcher This service completely transformed the way mobile users downloaded songs on mobiles. Customers could hold the mobile device near the source of music and the song could be downloaded as a Hello Tune in their phone through a voice recognition software

Pioneered the launch of Blackberry phones in India which was then considered to be the most powerful instant e-mail mobile innovation.

Promoting rural connectivity Bharti Airtel partnered with the Government of Gujarat in the ‘eGRAM Connectivity Infrastructure Project’. Under this first-of-its kind programme in the country, the Company undertook a massive rural connectivity exercise linking 13,716 villages of Gujarat with Common Service Centers (CSCs) by setting up telecom infrastructure.

2005

2004

PrOvISION Of INNOvAtIvE SErvIcES

69

2008

Bring Apple 3g Phones in India Bharti Airtel in association with Apple launched 3G enabled iPhone for its customers in India. ‘iPhone 3G’ combined all the revolutionary features of iPhone along with 3G networking that was twice as fast as compared to an earlier version of iPhone.

Promoting financial Inclusion Bharti Airtel introduced ‘Airtel Money,’ India’s first mobile banking platform which enabled users to load money into their mobile phones. The device could then operate like a virtual wallet. Airtel Money was India’s first telecom-led mobile wallet service to offer money transfer service.

Launched 3G Bharti Airtel introduced its first 3G (Third Generation Mobile Telephone) service in India with a launch in Bangalore, India.

Launched 4G services Bharti Airtel began a new chapter in India’s telecom history by launching 4G LTE (Long Term Evolution) in Kolkata. This technology evolution enabled customers to access superfast mobile internet at nearly ten times the existing wireless speed.

Network Experience center (NEc) In an endeavor to provide seamless quality of service to its customers, the NEC was the first of its kind facility in India which monitored Airtel’s network performance across all product segments, International Cable Systems and internet peering points from a single location.

2011

2012

70

‘One touch Internet’A first of its kind initiative aimed at simplifying internet service for first-time users in India. ‘One Touch Internet’ was a WAP (Wireless Application Protocol) portal designed with a simple, secure and intuitive interface that allowed first-time mobile web users to discover the internet easily.

Becomes the third largest mobile operator in the worldIn June 2015, Bharti Airtel crossed a major land-mark in its journey when London based World Cellular Information Service (WCIS) acknowledged Airtel as the third largest mobile operator in the world with 303 million subscribers across its oper-ations in Asia and Africa.

Project leap One of the world’s largest network transformation project with a cumulative investment of `60000 to develop a smart and dynamic network by upgrading the passive and active network infrastructure over the next 3 years.

2014

2015

Wynk Music A carrier agnostic mobile application enabling music lovers to groove to their favourite songs on their smartphones while on the move. The platform enabled customers access an ‘expert curated’ library of 1.7 million regional and international songs across eight languages. The launch enabled Airtel to become the first telecom operator to introduce an OTT (Over-the-Top) mobile application in the Indian market.

71

Customers and our stakeholders form the core of our business, and their interests are a top priority for us. Airtel takes its responsibility of protecting customer data, and ensuring their privacy, very seriously. We implement our commitment through a range of policies, management systems, processes and initiatives across all our operations.

PrOtEctINg cUStOMEr INtErEStS, PrIvAcy ANd

dAtA SEcUrIty

72

PrOtEctINg cUStOMEr INtErEStS ANd BUIldINg trANSPArENcy

AirTeL believes in transparency and empowering users to manage their own Airtel products & services with ease. Airtel has consistently made efforts in this direction whether it is through our Open Network, enriched self-care or ever evolving powerful MyAirtel App. This year, Airtel has successfully implemented various initiatives to increase transparency for our customers and/or reduce the surprises arising due to bill shock and lack of awareness about services.

Building Transparency – India’s first Open network

An industry first initiative, ‘Open Network’ is a paradigm shift in the way a telecom operator engages with its customers to build a better network. Under the initiative, the Company established complete transparency by opening up the mobile network information to customer for scrutiny and feedback.

Airtel opened up its network information through an interactive online interface. Based on a colour code, it displays mobile network coverage/signal strength along with network site deployment. The Company has created multiple touch points (web portal, MyAirtel app, call-centres and Airtel stores) for customers to register their feedback on network experience. So far, the Open Network platform has received more than 10 million hits. Millions of customers including many residential welfare associations in different parts of India have reached out with site leads.

Almost 160 Million customers reached

More than 9 Million page visits on the portal - 8 Million unique visitors

6.3 Million queries resolved in first interaction

More than 9000 base stations were either upgraded or new sites came on-air

73

• Airtel has initiated radical changes that redefine the value proposition for domestic and international roaming and has already launched innovative and affordable international roaming packs for all major countries across the world. With this, Airtel mobile customers will be able to carry their numbers across India and the world and stay connected all the time without having to worry about high call/data charges. Bill shocks will now be a thing of the past.

• Starting April 1, 2017, Airtel customers roaming within India will enjoy free incoming calls/SMS and there will be no premium on outgoing calls allowing them to speak freely wherever they are within the country. Also, there will be no additional data charges on national roaming. Home data packs for customers will apply even while they roam across India.

Airtel declares war on international roaming

74

We, AT AirTeL, give utmost importance to community health and safety. We acknowledge the growing public concern regarding exposure to electromagnetic fields (EMF) and maintain complete transparency of our position. We ensure clarity and transparency of our position and share the updated, research backed facts regarding EMF, with the general public. As per the latest government regulation on EMF, our base stations are compliant with the emission norms and all our existing 336773 BTS’s are self-certified. These sites are also subject to random checks and audits by the Telecom Enforcement Resource and Monitoring (TERM) Cells of DoT. In the 21615 physical site audits done by the TERM cell in FY 2016-17, 99.9% of sites were found compliant with existing norms and for the remaining sites, corrective action was promptly initiated. In addition to this, Airtel, in partnership with the Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI), conducts various programmes, workshops, seminars and stakeholder meets to build awareness about the issue of EMF.

SAfEgUArdINg cUStOMEr HEAltH ANd SAfEty

do towers have a negative impact on living beings?

Radio Frequency (RF) waves are the basic building blocks of mobile communication.

These frequencies, typically in 800-2300 MHz band are part of the Microwave category within the Electromagnetic Spectrum.

Electromagnetic waves are used in most aspects of life such as medicine, television and radio reception and the differentiating factor of their adverse effect is their frequency.

Mobile communications use the lowest frequency in the electromagnetic spectrum and the effect is equivalent to watching television and even lesser than the frequency emitted by visible sunlight used for seeing as depicted in the chart above.

Non-ioninzing waves have much lower frequency and energy, hence, safe.

tHE ElEctrOMAgNEtIc SPEctrUM

NON-IONIzINg IONIzINg

75

An initiative led by the Department of Telecommunication Govt. of India, will enable users to actively check EMF radiation of any mobile tower on a real time basis.

Various awareness sessions are being conducted across India along with the government and industry associations to demystify the myth around EMF.

EMf Portal- Promoting transparency

Building Awareness around EMf

76

We, AT AirTeL, are fully devoted to safeguarding customer privacy and interests not only for legal and regulatory compliance but in order to strengthen and nourish our bond with the customers and stakeholders. In order to facilitate the same, we have embedded stringent policies, systems and checks to ensure the privacy of information.

ENSUrINg cUStOMEr dAtA PrIvAcy ANd PrOtEctION

Internet Safety and Security

We work with the industry, government, law enforcement and community organisations to help our customers understand and manage the risks associated with the online world. We support a range of government initiatives to raise awareness, and provide online education and guidance. Some of the measures undertaken in the last few years include:

1. Proactively filtering offensive content available online which is not compliant with the state laws

2. Working with CERT-In to intimate our customers proactively on malware infections

3. Upgrading technology constantly to reduce threat exposures

4. Associating with Law Enforcement Agencies (LEA) to support investigations

5. Actively participating in multiple national level working groups and numerous international forums on internet safety and Cyber security

77

• Embedded strict internal policies and procedures within our organization to protect privacy of

customer’s personal information from unauthorized use, disclosure, modification or misuse.

• Established an efficient fraud management programme driven by revenue assurance and fraud

management experts, which makes use of highly sophisticated and evolved tools and processes to

detect and prevent occurrences of fraud.

• To protect our customer’s financial information, we have been certified against the Payment cards

Industry data Security Standard (PcI dSS). Some of the steps to ensure the compliance are building

and maintaining secure networks to protect cardholder data, encrypt transmission of cardholder data

across networks, maintaining a vulnerability management program and implementing strong access

control measures.

• Restricted the access to subscriber data on need-to-know basis by customer care services or other

department dealing with critical customer information. Each person has been assigned a unique ID and

all activities using these IDs are monitored closely. All incidents of information leakage are tracked and

strict actions are taken against the offender.

Data protection at Airtel addresses the underlying people, process and technology. This includes defining the strategy, classification policy, assessing the processes and improving on the technology.

• Management of incidences, the consequences of the incidences.

• Policy management

• User awareness & communication

• Ownership of data and henceforth the accountability of that data.

• documenting finger prints

• Analysis of incidences

• data loss prevention agents

• Email analysis

• Social media and Internet access monitoring

BISP

Regulatory, Fiduciary, Governance, Compliance & etc.

Our Measures to protect customer information

dAtA PrOtEctION

People

ProcessTechnology

79

191 Tonnes of paper saved in facilities

Around 1200 Tonnes of paper saved through e-bill initiatives

75% reduction in CO2 emission per TB in the past 4 years

Over 3200 number of solar enabled towers deployed by our infrastructure partners

33% reduction in CO2 emission per rack in our data centers in the past 3 years

1.3 Mn liters of diesel saved in our network infrastructure

Over 71.4 Mn units of renewable power wheeled into our operations

Around 1800 MWH energy saved in our facilities

Reducing the impact of telecom

infrastructure on the environment

Reducing the carbon footprint in

our operations

Our focus Areas

Resource and waste optimization

Highlights fy 2016-17

80

We, AT AirTeL, believe that the Information and Communications Technology Industry has a pivotal role to play in shaping the future. That’s why we keep a hawk’s eye on resource and energy consumption, greenhouse gas emissions and waste handling procedures.

As a responsible corporate we have taken measures like shifting to greener mobile tower technologies to reduce our carbon footprint by a whopping 70%.

Reducing our direct and indirect environmental impact by investing in innovative energy conservation technologies for our network, facilities and data centers in association with our partners

Resource optimization and waste management by recycling of waste and optimal utilization of available physical space

OUr EffOrtS ArE fOcUSEd IN:

81

AirTeL along with its network-infrastructure

partners has taken a resolve to re-invent and

reduce the environmental footprint of their

business and operations. Along our journey

on the path of sustainability, we have already

explored and implemented several green

solutions to curb emissions. We are also

continuously in search of more energy efficient

technologies and innovative solutions for a

greener future.

In today’s fast moving world, our network

infrastructure needs to be at its optimal best at

all times. The unavailability of reliable power is a

critical issue for remote network sites. DGs and

batteries are usually used as alternatives to keep

the equipment running in the absence of grid

power supply. Through our persistent efforts,

along with our network partners, we have been

able to upgrade and convert the existing telecom

towers into energy efficient towers, reducing the

reliance on electricity from the grid or diesel.

The next step is maximizing the adoption of

green wheeling for sourcing our power from

renewable sources and in the process, reducing

our carbon footprint.

rEdUcINg tHE NEgAtIvE IMPAct Of tElEcOM INfrAStrUctUrE ON

tHE ENvIrONMENt

82

Some major interventions in our mobile network, undertaken along with our network infrastructure partners in this direction include:

1. ENERGY ACqUISITION: • rooftop Solar Energy at Main Switching centers

Over the past 5 years, 17 rooftop solar plants were set up at our main switching centers, with a total generation capacity of 1 MWp. In FY 2016-17, rooftop solar plants were installed at 3 locations with a total installed capacity of 193 kWp.

• green Power wheeling agreements for purchase of green energy, through open access. For the past few years around 88 Mn units were contracted under wheeling from renewable sources.

2. ENERGY EFFICIENCY AND DEMAND REDUCTION

• deployment of low-power consuming Base transceiver Station (BtS) We have been able to achieve a reduction in power consumption by a minimum of 30% over the last 4-5 years. In FY 2016-17, we deployed 4301 such base stations.

• Site sharing - We introduced the concept of telecom passive infrastructure sharing to the world almost a decade ago. Currently, over 3422 sites representing 45% of our total sites are deployed on sharing. This initiative has helped reduce the energy consumption by 30% as compared to a standalone site.

• Outdoor BtS deployment has reduced energy requirements by 30%. In FY 2016-17, we deployed 7206 outdoor sites.

• Battery Hybrid solutions have been implemented in over 11946 additional sites by our network partners, across the country, to eradicate the use of diesel.

• conversion of indoor to outdoor sites to avoid running of air-conditioners during favorable ambient temperatures, and reduce consumption of grid power when it’s available. Implementation of energy efficient technology such as Free Cooling Units (FCU) and solar natural cooling unit (NCU) have replaced the use of air conditioners. Over 48973 tower sites have been implemented with FCU and around 15000 converted in the FY 2016-17.

3. DESIGN MODIFICATIONS AND INNOVATIONS

83

Airtel is working relentlessly along with its partners on expanding their green energy portfolio by embracing various technologies like wind energy, biomass, zero emission batteries etc.

ExPlOrINg grEEN ENErgy SOlUtIONS

Solar-DG Hybrid Solution: A unique and innovative solution that uses 3 kw -7 kw capacity solar panels in tandem with battery banks, which helped reduce the DG run hours from 20 to 6 hours a day by providing 18 hours of power. The system is further optimized by a hybrid solar controller. In 2016-17, 3263 own and partner sites implemented solar hybrid solutions with installed capacity of 17.4 MWp.

Rooftop Solar Energy at Main Switching Centers (MSC): Over the past 4 years, 17 rooftop solar plants were set up at our main switching centers, with a total generation capacity of 1 MWp.

Trials for Solar Natural Cooling in 381 sites were completed with 300 Wp on each site and partner sites by switching off air-conditioners and utilizing solar natural cooling to reduce the energy demand.

84

Sourcing renewable Energy through green Wheeling

Leveraging the opportunity provided by Open Access (Electricity Act, 2003) for non-discriminatory sale/purchase of electric power from various sources, including renewable sources:

• Signed green power wheeling agreements for procurement of green energy of 88 Mn units per annum

• Over 71.4 Mn units of renewable power is wheeled into our operations (Data centers, facilities, MSCs) in 3 states of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Maharashtra resulting in emission reduction of 585000 tonnes CO2 per annum

Eradicating Diesel from Our Switching Centers

Initiated in 2012 with India’s largest solar rooftop deployment by any telecom company in Gangagunj switching center in Lucknow, we have shown steady progress in this area and deployed similar solutions in 17 switching

centers across 9 Indian states with a total installed capacity of 1MWp with a potential reduction of over 965 tonnes of CO2 per annum.

85

creating an impact

Our sustained efforts in the sphere of acquiring green energy, achieving efficiency, reducing demand and innovating for clean energy solutions are evidently reflected in the emission reduction we have managed to achieve over time. The graph below shows a comparative analysis of the emission levels for the last seven years. With the adoption of newer, better technology making renewable energy more viable, this will decline progressively.

28.7% reduction in cO2 emission per TB from last year

1.3 Mn Litres of diesel saved

81% reduction in cO2 emission per TB since 2010-11

2010-11 2011-12

Tonn

es C

O2/T

B

81% Reduction

2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16 2016-17

1.1

2

1.7

4.35

.8

8.4

11

.212

.1

2.5

4.2

6

8.3

12

.91

0.1

3.1

6

Grid CO2 emission in tonnes per TB Diesel CO2 emission in tonnes per TB

Emission Reduction In Our Network Infrastructure

86

We, AT AirTeL, always try and go the extra mile to preserve the environment. This involves constantly challenging ourselves to innovate, seek and adopt solutions for our energy-intensive infrastructure, enhance the efficiency of our facilities and data centres, and develop options to replace carbon-intensive energy sources.

We have made considerable improvements in this direction and have implemented a number of initiatives over the years to reduce energy consumption and optimize resource utilization at our facilities and data centres.

developing a green Workplace

At Airtel, it is our constant endeavor to develop a “green workplace” by reducing our environment footprint through deployment of renewable energy solutions, optimizing resources and improving energy efficiency. Several initiatives were undertaken last year, some of which include:

1. Lighting Optimization – energy efficient lighting depending on occupancy rates and light intensity levels needed for implementation of different tasks.

2. Retrofitting of old technologies with energy efficient technologies.

3. Energy optimization through UPS optimization, improving chiller efficiency, HVAC optimization by controlling heating/air conditioning.

4. Installation of innovative technologies including:

a. We are using Enisaver (Quasar Enviro) smart high-tech devices and energy efficient cooling systems for our offices. The Enisaver’s algorithm optimises the running of the compressor, without any alteration to the cooling comfort in the conditioned space and reduces energy spent by 15%-20%.

b. Installation of collective control system in lifts such as “Duplexor” to help in reducing power consumption by sing logic to dispatch nearest lift in the direction of travel.

In fy 2016-17, Our energy saving initiatives have resulted in saving 1800 MWh units of electricity and 23% of reduction in cO2 emission/ square feet.

Our reliance on diesel has dropped to 15% of the total electricity usage.

kWH emission reduction

Lighting optimization (adjusting light intensity, use of natural light, LED installation)

61%

HVAC upgradation for efficient heating and cooling

10%

Energy Optimization (UPS optimization, improving chiller efficiency)

Innovative solutions

28%

2%

rEdUcINg tHE cArBON fOOtPrINt IN OUr

OPErAtIONS

87

23% reduction in cO2 emissions from energy per square feet

0.63% reduction in diesel emissions per square feet from fy 2015-16

2014-15

Years

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

CO

2 in

tonn

es/s

q. ft

.

2015-16 2016-17

0.88

14.9913.58

10.39

0.59 0.5

Grid CO2 emission in tonnes per sq. ft. Diesel CO2 emission in tonnes per sq. ft.

Towards Building Green

In a first-of-its-kind endeavor in India, we have installed a 100 KWp solar power plant at the Airtel Campus at Manesar which utilizes the car parking space for generating green energy. We see this as the beginning of many more such endeavors in the future.

creating an impact

We have not only managed to reduce our reliability on diesel but have also cut down on our CO2 emissions considerably as is evident by the trend in the last three years.

Emission Trends For Our Facilities

27% reduction

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Data centers are energy intensive, which drive us to develop green data centers that ensure that we operate in the most energy efficient manner. Across all our six data centres in India, we have implemented comprehensive energy conservation and efficiency programs through the following initiatives:

• Energy usage optimization which eradicates energy hot spots though UPS optimization, installation of power factor controllers and installation of precision air handling units

• cold Aisle containment which lowers energy consumption and provides more efficient cooling

• Installation of variable frequency drivers (vfd’s) which reduce motor speeds and consume less power when the system is running low

• Inclined towards maintaining a power utilization efficiency (PUE) of less than 2 to improve effectiveness across all data centers

• Sourcing renewable wind energy in 2 of our data centers

In fy 2016-17,

the carbon dioxide emissions per rack reduced by 9% as compared to the previous year, and 33% in the past 3 years.

Over 4.2 Million units sourced from renewable energy solutions

Around 25% reliance on diesel in all the data centres

Annual usage of diesel dropped by almost 2.8 Million litres as compared to 2012

creating green data centers

89

2016-17

27

.52

.5

2015-16

31

2

2014-15

Years

Tonn

es o

f CO

2/r

ack

41

2

2013-14

44

1

2012-13

46

2

Grid CO2 emission in tonnes/rack Diesel CO2 emission in tonnes/rack

creating an impactWhile our reliance on diesel is already at a bare minimum, we have also managed to reduce our carbon emissions drastically in the last five years.

Emission Trends For Our Data Centers

Pool2Park campaignStarted in 2016, the Pool2Park campaign was launched with the aim of reducing our employees carbon footprint. In partnership with Orahi, this initiative brought all those keen on carpooling, onto one platform through a diligently designed app, a dedicated helpdesk and an integrated payments system.

reduction in cO2 emissions in tonnes per rack achieved this year

9%

37% reduction

Over 185000 number of kms shared

Over 18 Tonnes of cO2 emissions saved

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Moving towards a greener Paperless future

We dream to have a future where paper would be history. In the mean time we have taken a series of initiatives that are stepping-stones towards making this dream a reality:

• Encouraging electronic billing and online payment methods in place of physical copies of bills and receipts. In FY 2016-17, we witnessed a 22% increase in the number of customers that opted for paperless bills over FY 2015-16. This helped us save over 1289 Mn sheets of paper since FY 2011-12. New connections sold with e-mail/e-bill options are also increasing and accounts to 56% of total new postpaid connections.

• Airtel adopted an Adhaar based instant verification process, which is secure and will eliminate paperwork.

• Automated queue-management-based printing solutions and automated intra-office approval processes for helping reduce paper consumption.

• Promoting recycling of used paper in our facilities. In FY 2016-17, 191 tonnes of paper was used, of which 27% was recycled through our partners. Blue bins have been installed to maximize collection in offices.

rESOUrcE ANd WAStEOPtIMIzAtION

As A LeAding CoMpAny in the Telecommunication

landscape, we ensure that we make a positive impact on the industry and the environment we operate in. This drives us to keep a sharp eye on our resources, waste generation and its disposal. Through innovative technologies, reusing and recycling, we have been able to cut down considerably on the waste generated. Apart from that, we also influence our partners and suppliers to reduce their environmental footprint and disclose the same publicly.

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Water management is not a material issue for us being a telecommunication services industry where water is used only in our facilities for domestic purposes. However various initiatives were undertaken last year to conserve and recycle water, some of which include:

Electronic Waste Management

At Airtel, the e-waste generated from technology upgradation, capacity augmentation and others, is traced end-to-end, handled and recycled as per the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) guidelines.

The waste collected at the warehouse is segregated and dismantled further to be recycled and in some cases, recovered using chemical processes. The batch of waste is scavenged and swapped to revive working parts, ensuring reusability and inter-operability, hence, minimising the waste generated. All the non-reusable hazardous waste including lead batteries are disposed through authorised recyclers, who have acquired the requisite clearance from the Central/State Pollution Control Board/s. In FY 2016-17, over 2400 tonnes of e-waste from IT and network infrastructure was responsibly recycled through our authorised partners. In a drive to reuse waste, over 500000 dtH units were refurbished from our India operations.

• All our facilities are equipped to reduce water consumption and augment rainwater harvesting wherever feasible, as well as minimize waste generation, and maximize reusing and recycling.

• We have installed efficient water fixtures, sensors and retrofitted water fixtures with aerators and float adjustments to reduce water utilization.

• Sewage Treatment Plants (STPs) are installed in facilities for handling domestic waste water, which is recycled for use in HVAC cooling towers, washroom flushing and gardening.

Water Sustenance

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17491 number of employees

32.8% of employees under the age of 30

Over 4800 employees donated

a total of INR 3.84 Mn to Bharti Foundation for their school program

Around 40% female representation in our Young Leaders intake

82% of the employees Code of Conduct certified in FY 2016

Over 76% internal succession rate in middle and senior management

98% India based

partners and 65% of local procurement by value

53 average man hours of training provided per employee

Building a high performance culture through embedding

the Talent First Strategy

creating an inclusive and

diverse workforce

Our focus Areas

Build enduring partner

relationships

developing a safe, healthy and ethical

work culture

Highlights fy 2016-17

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At Airtel, we believe that our talent is the single biggest differentiator that has made us the market leader in India and catapulted us to become the third largest mobile provider in the world, with more than 372 million customers globally.

Our values of being Alive, Inclusive and Respectful, drive the essence of our manner of existence and functioning, the core ingredients of which are service, integrity, trust, teamwork and accountability. These create an environment for the individual, a win-win situation, where not only does he/she prosper and grow as an individual but also drives the vision and mission of the organization.

Our code of conduct –

Bharti Airtel is committed to achieving the highest principles of integrity and ethics. Its Code of Conduct (Code) outlines the Company’s expected standards of ethical conduct and behaviour. Bharti’s core values represent mutual respect, trust and personal growth for all.

Our culture, together with our values, competencies and code of conduct, is the glue that binds our people, and creates lasting and happy relationships within Airtel, and with millions of our customers.

EMBEddINg OUr cUltUrE ANd OUr vAlUES

AlIvE Alive to the needs of our customers

drive Execution Excellence

Build teams, develop talent & Self

Build collaborative Relationships

Focus on the customer

Be Entrepreneurial

INclUSIvE Champion diversity by keeping an open mind and embracing change.

rESPEctfUl Act with humility, always be open and honest, to achieve mutual respect.

Our culture – customers at the heart of everything we do

At Airtel, we believe that our success is a reflection of our culture - we put customers at the heart of everything we do. Our vision is to enrich the lives of our customers and our obsession is to ‘win customers for life’. We act with passion, energy and a ‘can do’ attitude to help customers realize their dreams. We take pride in our entrepreneurial spirit - if it can’t be done, we will find a way!

Our values that define who we are -

Our competencies that define how we work –

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“Win with people” is one of the key business priorities for the past couple of years. This strategy focuses at deeply embedding “talent first” to build a high performance culture, capabilities and processes to help people deliver and grow, and develop cross functional expertise.

create a high performance culture through embedding talent first

grow talent through strong learning, mentoring and succession planning

...that is driven by three enablers...

OUr tAlENt fIrSt AgENdA

“I know whatI need to do”

Clarity and transparency on career paths that gives confidence on

Leaders and Talent Councils responsible for identifying and developing future leaders making

Structured induction programs for new joinees centred around our values, culture and business that create the

Iconic learning programs covering functional expertise, leadership and business insight

Smart organization design with enhanced roles, wider spans and cross-functional collaboration that makes

Motivating employee experience through engagement, energized workplace and seamless collaboration

Top notch branding on campus and social media that projects

Deeply embed our values and culture that define

Women are increasingly taking up leadership roles in Airtel and becoming role models for others. Culture and policies that promote

Clarity on how each employee contributes through sharply defined 3+1s

“I have a future here”

“Succession planning a way of life in Airtel”

“Right impression for a flying start”

“I am confident of delivering”

“Airtel an exciting place to work”

“I feel energized and connected”

“Airtel as the employer of choice”

“Who we are and how we work in Airtel”

“More diversity in Airtel”

BUIldINg A HIgH PErfOrMANcE cUltUrE

By EMBEddINg tHE tAlENt fIrSt StrAtEgy

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crEAtINg A cUltUrE Of PErfOrMANcE ExcEllENcE

With the aim of creating a culture of high performance excellence, our integrated talent and Performance Management process was launched with the following key tenets:

• To establish a process of “One view of talent” which is co-owned by all leaders

• To ensure sharper talent segmentation

• To design segmented strategies to develop people and prepare a strong leadership pipeline

• To ensure robust succession planning for critical positions

Our talent and performance management process marked a paradigm shift in the way talent was reviewed and engaged at Airtel. The process made the employee the focal point of all activities. No longer was the performance assessment process limited to the performance dialogue and the distribution of annual rewards. The process involved other cornerstones of a holistic dialogue in addition to the performance discussion – an employee’s development and career conversation.

“I know what I need to do”

97

BUIldINg AN ENgAgEd WOrkfOrcE

At Airtel, we believe in creating an environment where our employees experience a feeling of belonging, “I feel energized and connected” through:

connecting through Hive

Airtel also implemented ‘HR on Cloud’, a state-of- the-art HR system from Oracle, which enables the Company to manage all people processes seamlessly. Its best people practices are hard-coded and all employees have been empowered with easy-to-use tools that are personalized, digital and social, delivering insights across the entire employee lifecycle. Airtel’s successful launch of one global instance, of this system, across 17 countries in one stroke was appreciated at the Oracle Open World India Conference.

1. deliver on employee experience - Delivering on employee experience by ensuring a delightful on-boarding experience, access to HR SPOCs and self-enabled platforms which guide the employee in every aspect of the job

2. Build a strong connect - Creating motivating and moving employee experiences through regular connect with leaders, increasing employee engagement and creating more opportunities for rewards and recognition

3. Foster seamless collaboration - Creating communities of interest internally by leveraging technology, mobile apps etc.

“I feel energized and connected”

1. deliver on employee experience

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kudos at workplace

Kudos is a core recognition program that focuses on building and driving a culture of recognition, across the various circles, function as well as peer recognition, to celebrate stellar efforts and exemplary performance. The program is based on the concept of recognition amongst employees through reward points which can either be accumulated or redeemed by the recipient employees. A wide range of products are available on the portal for redemption of the points. In the FY 16-17, 13360 Kudos points were distributed and 6963 unique employees were recognized (39% employees)

2. Build a strong connect

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Listening to our employees

Launched in 2016, Mood-o-meter is a mobile based app which serves as a platform to share employee views about Airtel. The app gives employees an option to provide feedback on-the-go which is in turn used to create a better working environment. In addition to this, the responses from employees also captures the relevance of learning and development goals to the career path identified and provides a feedback to the organization about its managers and the quality of counselling and mentoring.

3. foster Seamless collaboration

Closely knit around our four HR key pillars of “I know what I need to do”, “I am confident of delivering”, “I have a future here” & “I feel energized & connected”, the Air Pulse survey our employee engagement survey, was conducted in FY 2016-17, the survey

achieved over 84% response rate and an engagement score of 79%.

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With an aim to create a culture of ownership, a mindset for self’s career and to communicate the various opportunities available across Airtel, quarterly career fairs are conducted for a week across locations. Some of the key activities during these events involve:

• Sessions by the Airtel leadership including candid individual talks by the leadership led by the CEO in addition to panel discussions with groups of other Airtel Management Board members

• External speakers and motivational trainers

• Fireside chats led by domain experts and functional leaders in smaller groups for employees to have informal tête-à-têtes and explore opportunities

• career kiosks which run through the week around opportunities to internally upskill yourself and opportunities to internally move within the organization

To enable employees to take ownership of their future in Airtel, a career week was organized in 16 locations pan India and reached out to more than 8000 Airtel employees.

For a great future in Airtel with a multitude of

opportunities

In yourself by learning & up skilling on required

competencies

By acting on opportunities available

across functions

Aspire Invest Move

BUIldINg trANSPArENcy ON cArEEr PAtH

“I have a future here”

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Learning and development is always an ongoing process. And we at Airtel, try to achieve that with the 70:20:10 principle.

70:20:10 stands for 70% on the job development, 20% cross-functional exposure, and 10% academic and theoretical training programs. Learning and development at Airtel begins with instilling confidence in employees, developing faith in one’s own ability, and embedding the belief that they can create a future with us, here. The key tenents include:

• Enable employees to plan their own learning calendar and development agenda through the Learning Management System, iLearn with exciting e-Learning, leader videos and mobile-ready content

• Ensure functional excellence and leadership development by designing iconic programs tied to Airtel leadership as well as the functional competencies in our journey to create well rounded leaders

• Groom for leadership roles by building general management exposure through Airtel “business track” learning (business simulation, live case studies from Airtel). Encourage cross-functional participation and learnings

• Plan learning interventions aligned to the 70:20:10 framework of learning which include on the job projects, mentoring of senior leaders, classroom sessions and e-Learnings

BUIldINg A lEArNINg OrgANIzAtION

“I am confident of delivering”

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All round development Aimed at Success

Holistic development of the workforce guides a wholesome

growth of the organization. Keeping this in mind, we have

formulated an employee development strategy with three important aspects - Functional,

Behavioral and Leadership.

Targeted towards developing Airtel compentencies and skills required towards enhancing self and building social awareness.• Self & Social Awareness

• Ownership & Accountability

• Impact and Influence

• Problem solving and analytical skills

• Desicion making

• Innovation

• Collaborative Relationships

Interventions – 152

Training hours - 258427

Behavioral

Functional

Aimed at building capabilities that raise functional excellence.• Induction

• Academies

• Functional knowledge/skill building

• Partnering tracks and SME tracks

Interventions – 194

Training hours - 672326

Specific focus on developing different aspects of leadership at higher management levels.• First Time Managers

• Manager of Managers

• Leadership Development

• Enterprise Leaders

Interventions – 25

Training hours - 4519

Leadership

103

Airtel has a strong focus on leveraging technology to move towards a new way of learning that’s concise, allows learning on the go and at a person’s own pace, and can be revisited, as and when required. A repository for all user training related information, i-Learn helps to facilitate a healthy and useful learning experience for our employees. Our partnership with Lynda and Harvard has provided our employees access to 2000+ high quality courses that they are free to take. Currently i-learn houses 233 customised online courses including 20 courses developed by Harvard faculty, 15 “nugget” courses developed inhouse for bite size learning and over 160 courses designed for enhancing personal effectiveness

Gurucool is an initiative which aims at creating an environment of continuous learning through frequent knowledge sharing within the team on topical and upcoming technology practice areas. The underlying thought behind this program is to harness peer to peer learning which we believe is an efficient and cost effective way of increasing skills and knowledge while simultaneously fostering collaboration and cross-vertical appreciation.

Transforming learning and development through digitization

Nurturing continuous learning through Gurucool

Over 370 training Interventions

935272 manhours of training delivered in fy 2016-17

Each employee received an average of 53 hours of training

Over `5000 invested in training and development per employee

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Training and career development is vital at Airtel. Keeping this in mind, the ‘Brass Tacks’ programme, a three-phase cross functional module aims at building the fundamentals of Distribution, Marketing, Network and Finance among our employess.

The Young Leaders Program is a 12 month structured program for young recruits from premium B-schools. Established in 2001, the program is aimed at creating a pool of business leaders for tomorrow, who are mentored under the direct ownership of Airtel Management Board. The young leaders get an opportunity to interact with senior leaders and learn from them.

The program exposes young leaders to different aspects of the organization through various stints like Functional Stint, Cross Functional Stint, Global Stint and Corporate Social Responsibility. At the end of the program, these young minds are ready to make the transition from B-schools to leadership roles.

In the year 2016, 53 recruits were chosen as Young Leaders of which 20 were women. The functions covered under the program included General Management, Finance, Human Resources and Supply Chain Management.

Promoting functional trainings at circle offices

Nurturing leaders for tomorrow- young leaders Program

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Consistent skill and knowledge acquisition is at the core of a thriving, competent workforce. Committed and invested to this end, we at Airtel encourage employees to identify and pursue relevant academic opportunities for their function, through the “Continuing Education Policy”(CEP). CEP adds value to their existing skill sets, and also greatly enhances their competency for future roles with us.

Employee-Manager discussions are central to identifying development areas. Airtel’s learning management system recommends courses based on the development areas, thus identified. Employees can choose from varied options like part-time educational courses, distance courses, weekend diploma/degree courses or professional certifications. Airtel supports the education by supporting up to 75% of tuition fee including the travel and accommodation costs

‘Role Certifications’, an online module of development interventions to equip employees with the capability and skill set to tackle present and future career challenges and roles.The certifications curriculum is available to all employees as a compiled set of e-learning interventions such as on-the-job projects, relevant videos, TED Talks, and book/movie lists that employees should read or watch!

Higher Education for Better capabilities

corporate course Book development

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In fy 2016-17, we had an internal succession rate of over 76% in middle and senior management

Making leaders accountable for talent development. Encouraging leaders to take bets on young talent and supporting them with necessary mentoring

Tracking Development Action Plans (DAPs) for identified successors and ensuring iconic L&D interventions, on-the-job experiences, exposure, coaching etc.

Conducting regular succession for critical roles and succession planning through the year, not just at the year end

Having a ready talent pipeline for some of our critical roles

“SUccESSION PlANNINg, A WAy Of

lIfE At AIrtEl”

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“Airtel is for everyone .. we champion diversity recognizing the breadth and depth of the communities we serve in ...”

At Airtel, we believe that a diverse environment enhances innovation, productivity, and creativity and is vital to our success. With this in mind, Airtel has always consciously adopted a policy of equal opportunity for all people related activities, be it recruitment, selection, career planning, or growth. We are an equal opportunity employer and are secular and non-partisan in our practices relating to people and consciously work at ensuring that airtel represents a truly global and multi-cultural organization – the very essence of diversity.

Over the years various initiatives were undertaken to promote diversity some of which include mentorship programs, talent acquisition partner reward program, KPI’s around diversity as part of talent management strategy and other welfare programs such as celebrating diversity day, day-care facilities, flexible work timing options and sabbatical programs.

crEAtINg AN INclUSIvE ANd

dIvErSE WOrkfOrcE

108

WE AcHIEvE - An initiative to recognize and award talent to women employees for their professional accomplishments that have had a positive and significant business impact.

WE tHOUgHt lEAdErSHIP- An initiative to inspire women employees to become thought leaders in a domain of their choice, share their stories that can inspire fellow women colleagues to achieve more themselves.

With a focus towards promoting gender diversity, “WE’- Women Empowered” has been developed this year which is based on an over-arching theme of:

coached to achieve!

The various interventions undertaken this year under the “WE” initiative include

WE SENSE – Gender sensitization workshop for all people managers to inculcate the mindset of diversity and inclusion

WE lEAd – An engaging platform with a series of monthly sessions crafted to provide an opportunity to meet distinguished leaders including CXOs, women entrepreneurs et al across industries, to hear their stories, learn from their experiences and thus be inspired to aspire to achieve more themselves.

WE MENtOrSHIP– A focused mentorship program for middle and senior level talent that encourages women employees to identify their development areas and accordingly be mentored by senior leaders in the company

Aspire to achieve more Believe in oneself and

WE cHIt cHAt – An online portal that enables women employees with an option to formally reach out and choose a leader as their mentor and get guidance on areas they want support. The portal enables conversations in the form of a chat that is confidential between the mentor and mentee.

WE UNWINd - Informal coffee sessions with top leaders of the company

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At Airtel, we ensure that we are inclusive even towards the physically disabled. Despite initial challenges, our hiring managers have made every effort to include the differently-abled into their teams. We are working towards making our offices accessible and inclusive for all.

Today, we have around 170 specially abled employees working with us.

Inclusion of the differently-abled

1520 women employed with us representing 8% of our workforce.

37.7% female representation in our young leaders intake

Nearly 12.6% of the new hires in fy 16-17 were women

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our aspiration is a zero injury/accident workplace. Our commitment to health and safety is driven by the stringent workplace health and safety policies that provide a comprehensive framework for ensuring a safe and incident-free workplace, effective investment in health promotion and disease prevention activities at all levels of the business. To ensure occupational health and safety throughout our operations, a dedicated safety team, led by a Safety Officer, was set up to monitor and maintain safe, healthy and injury-free working conditions.

Our policies towards a safe and healthy workplace

Regular Health checkup Policy

HIv/AIdS Policy

Parental leave Policy

Health Insurance Policy

domestic travel Safety and Security Policy

Workplace Safety Policy

Health Safety and Environment Policy

Policy for Safety of Women

To promote a culture of undergoing periodic comprehensive health check-ups and taking preventive measures, Airtel sponsors periodic health checkups basis the age of the employee and at a subsidized rate for the family members.

driving regular health checkups

dEvElOPINg A SAfE, HEAltHy ANd EtHIcAl

WOrk cUltUrE

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Airtel has always lived by strong values of respect, laid by its Code of Conduct, for our customers, employees and business associates. Each employee plays a significant role in maintaining the core value of the organisation by adhering to the Code in letter and spirit that ensures the company’s sustained growth. Airtel’s zero tolerance approach towards compliance violation reinforces integrity in every business action by its employees. A mandatory annual e-learning module and subsequent certification, acquaints employees with Bharti’s Code of Conduct guidelines and also demonstrates scenarios on

“How to proceed when faced with an ethical dilemma”.

Identification of breaches of CoC, misdemeanor and subsequent penalty to offenders is carried out by the office of Ombudsperson and Consequence Management Policies. The Consequence Management Policy prescribes actions in cases of violation of the Code of Conduct, policies and guidelines and financial impropriety including bribery, corruption, misreporting and non-reporting of critical information while the Ombudsperson investigates and takes action in case of any grievances pertaining to Company’s/individual’s conduct.

Women’s safety is prime focus area and an inherent part of our responsibility towards our employees. In 2016-17, we reinforced our commitment to this important task with several initiatives, including:

• Dedicated women safety policy that details various safety guidelines including safe and flexible early morning or late night outstation travel along with the provision of safe and guarded accommodation.

• Assurance of on premise and preferential parking spots to women across all locations.

• Provision of a security escort and cab service for women travelling beyond 8 pm upon their request and regular shuttle service to and from metro stations, where applicable.

• Regular communication on safety and security related issues/concerns

• Execution of self-defense programs in offices

Prioritizing women’ safety

Over 13500 employees underwent safety training in fy 2016-17.

82% of the employees have undergone annual coc certification.

No complaints received by Ombudsman office for child labour, forced labour or discriminatory employment during the year.

during 2016-17, 13 allegations of bribe/kickbacks were received and investigations were completed and appropriate actions were under taken as per consequence Management Policy.

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recognizing the interdependence between processes and partnerships, we

establish unique partnerships with suppliers to explore superior technology, develop innovative services and deliver improved customer services. Our business strategy revolves around fostering mutually beneficial relationships for a common sustainable goal and partnering with the best. In order to boost the socio-economic structure of the country, we encourage sourcing from within the region’s economy. Our partners pass through a rigorous procedure to ensure their compliance with the highest standards, regulations and guidelines. Continuous online surveys with our partners help us identify areas that have a scope for improvement and take required action. Partners that display great commitment receive benefits that enable them to grow.

• Partner World, Airtel’s online portal that allows its supply chain professionals to share information, interact/collaborate, and ultimately form closer relationships with Bharti Airtel’s external supply base. The Supplier Portal provides “Instant access to information by anyone from anywhere in the world”, our end to end partner management.

• Annual partnership events provide opportunities for our pan India partners to interact with the top management of Bharti Airtel and enable us to communicate our vision, mission, performance and business plans. Apart from these, regular engagement meetings are held to frequently discuss trends and analysis, product innovation and technology roadmap.

• Airtel handles partner grievances through the Supply Chain Council comprising of senior members of the supply chain function and issues related to ethics and integrity are handled as per the Ombudsman process drafted in the Bharti Airtel Code of Conduct.

We engage with partners through various touch points. Some of which include:

BUIldINg ENdUrINgPArtNEr

rElAtIONSHIPS

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• Airtel is committed to creating an ethical supply chain. We are driven and motivated in partnering with suppliers that have sustainable practices in place.

• Our partner selection is governed by rigorous principles of transparency, honesty, equal opportunity, fairness and confidentiality and environmental management. We scan our new suppliers across a range of key areas including human rights, governance, data privacy, security as well as workplace safety and health.

• Suppliers with certifications for high standards in their area of expertise are preferred during the screening process.

Achievement of management certifications including TL9000, ISO 9001, ISO27001, ISO 14001, OHSAS18001 and RoHS are given preference. Suppliers seeking the above certifications are assisted in undergoing a certification program within a defined period. Our Business Standards of conduct also mandate our suppliers to adhere to areas such as compliance with applicable laws, ethical competition, non-discrimination against employees, prohibition of child and forced labour, safe working conditions, compliance with environmental laws, accuracy of financial records, and avoidance of conflicts of interest.

Bolstering a sustainable supply chain

As of 31st March 2017,

We worked with over 64000 partners across the value chain

98% of the partners we worked with are based in India and 65% of the sourcing in terms of value was undertaken with them

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On the occasion of Women’s Day, over 290 women distributors across India were given a special gift hamper including a personalized message from the CEO. A grievance redressal module, exclusively for women was also launched on Anmol Ratna’s portal.

Distributors of Bharti Airtel were honored as Chief Guests during the Republic Day parade at Satya Bharti Schools of Bharti Foundation under our distributor engagement program, Anmol Ratna.

ENgAgINg WItH OUr dIStrIBUtOrS ANd cHANNEl PArtNErS

Airtel is dedicated in ensuring our channel partners that constitute our distribution network feel empowered and part of the Airtel family. Our engagement programs such as Navratna, Anmol Ratna and Yuva Ratna revolve around creating transparency, engaging them and giving them ample opportunities for our partners to grow. Incentives in the form of Airtel currency are provided on quarterly basis to partners showing great commitment. Airtel is also focusing on enabling our partners through a number digital interventions. Mobile applications namely MITRA and Revenue application have been launched in 2016 to help retailers and feet-on-street executives respectively to get real-time information on their daily queries, billings and provides recommendations to optimize their performance.

Some of the benefits provided to our channel partners include the following:

• Airtel Self care Module, an online platform, that empowers our partners to raise their issues in a fast and convenient manner• Accidental insurance cover of `500000 is provided to all our partners and their executives to aide them in turbulent times• Around 1300 scholarships worth `15 Mn given last year to the children of our channel partners and top retailers.

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SR - Sustainability Report AR - Annual Report

SR - Sustainability Report AR - Annual Report